


Blinded By The Light: Drabbles

by shewasagaystripper



Category: Queen (Band)
Genre: Blindness, Drabbles, M/M, blinded by the light
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-13
Packaged: 2019-08-01 13:20:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 60,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16285340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shewasagaystripper/pseuds/shewasagaystripper





	1. Barefoot

**Blinded By The Light: Barefoot**

‘Brian, I’m going outside!’

Roger hardly gave his boyfriend any time to react to his announcement; he was too excited about the warm weather during the scarce luxury of a whole afternoon off to stay inside to await Brian’s answer. He felt like had squandered enough time by sleeping in late already, so he didn’t want to waste any more precious minutes by something trivial like dressing up or waiting for his boyfriend’s approval to go outside. He didn’t care that he was standing barefooted in front of the backdoor in his pyjamas; he just wanted to go outside right now. He ran his fingertips along the door post until he eventually found the handle, but just as he pushed it down and opened the door, allowing the chilly morning air and the sound of birds tweeting to invade their kitchen, Brian responded, making Roger wish he had acted more quickly so he didn’t have to hear his sermons and orders.

‘Just for a little while, I don’t want you to catch a cold!’ Brian’s voice echoed from the living room, where the guitarist was dusting off the book shelf during one of his strangely-timed fits of cleaning rage. ‘And remember that you just got out of bed; you might still be a little drowsy, so please watch your step. And look out for the threshold, I don’t want you to trip over it again.’

Roger was only just able to oppress the tendency to roll his eyes. He knew that his boyfriend’s protectiveness was well-meant, but really, after having been blind for over nine months, Roger knew pretty much all of the treacherous thresholds, shelves and other vertical and horizontal protrusions of their house. He also didn’t think of it as necessary that Brian told him he had to be even more careful now; he knew he had to be extra vigilant this early in the morning when he was still sleepy. Warning him for the possibility of catching a cold didn’t seem worth mentioning either to Roger, considering the fact that it was the middle of August; it might still have been a little chilly at nine AM, but the sun was starting to rise both in height and in temperature release with every passing minute. It was too pleasantly warm to get cold in the first place, let alone catching an actual cold, especially given that Brian still insisted on Roger wearing long-sleeved pyjamas every night. The protectiveness literally dripped off everything Brian said and did, and Roger knew that the only way to soothe the concerns his partner had towards him, was to simply agree to all of his childish but well-meant orders and instructions.

‘Yes, Bri, I’ll look out,’ Roger said, fighting hard to hide the chuckle that threatened to shine through in his voice. He luckily succeed in this pretty well, but just as he was about to step over the infamous threshold that lead outside, Brian unfortunately remembered something Roger wished he hadn’t.

‘In case you’re not wearing any shoes yet, there must be a pair of clogs somewhere under the radiator. I don’t want you to go outside barefooted,’ Brian called out, and Roger sighed deeply.

 _Just because I can’t see them, doesn’t mean I’m going to blind other people with those monstrosities,_ Roger thought to himself. But, knowing that he was never going to get away with saying that he’d rather jump off a cliff than wear those pieces of pure disgrace, he decided not to say this out loud. Instead, he answered with an obedient ‘I’ll see if I can find them!’ and finally stepped out of the confinement of the kitchen and into their sunlit backyard. Roger carefully tiptoed along the rough-surfaced tiles that formed a path towards the small strip of grass that made up about half of their modestly sized garden. He trailed his fingertips along the bricks of their house, and after having inwardly counted a set pattern of nine steps on the pavement, the drummer sat down on the edge of the mildly warm grey tiles.

With the warmth of the faint morning sunrays shining on his face and the feeling of grass tickling the soles of his feet, Roger finally allowed himself to relax on this workless, schoolless Sunday morning. The realisation that there was a beautiful day of peace and quiet ahead for both Brian and him, a luxury that did not often show up during their busy studio days, made Roger appreciate the moment – simply sitting in the garden with closed eyes and an untroubled mind – all the more. Just being outside, warming his pyjama-clad body with the early morning sun, until Brian would probably eventually call him inside for breakfast. Roger hoped that this was going to take him a while, though; he was enjoying himself way too much in their garden, listening to the chirping sound of crickets and rubbing his bare feet over the slightly moist grass that was the result the morning dew that announced the arrival of a beautifully warm day.

Yet, after another moment of quiet enjoyment, Roger was disturbed by no longer just feeling the gentle, wet grass against his feet, but also something else; the tickling sensation of soft, feathery plush running along his soles, and a combination of the shock and the activation of his ticking senses made him instinctively jump right up.

‘Aaah!’ Roger emitted a wordless shriek as he clumsily tried to scramble off the pavement, but in his state of a weird combination of fright and the beginning traces of involuntary laughter, he only managed to back away slightly from the source of sudden torment. When the strange and extremely unpleasant ticklish feeling followed him, he knew that it could be only one thing – or one person, rather, that was doing this to him.

‘Brian, st-stop it!’ Roger cried out, laughing uncontrollably while helplessly kicking his feet at the unrecognisable entity that was currently disturbing his previously beautifully peaceful moment.

‘Stop doing what?’ Brian asked him quasi-naively, gladly continuing to rub the feather duster, which he had before been using to clean the dust-gathering series of long-forgotten encyclopaedias with, on the sensitive undersides of his boyfriend’s feet.

‘That t-thing! Please, stop it, I’m… I’m ticklish, please!’ Roger was begging by now, and Brian decided that he had pulled his blind boyfriend through enough shock and stress, certainly considering the fact that this was just meant to reprove him for not wearing shoes. Roger helplessly caught his breath and wiped away the tears that had appeared in the corners of his eyes as a result of just having been tickled when the devilish tool  was finally removed from his soles. He shakily stood up, flashing Brian a disapproving glance once he had located his position with his hand.

‘Brian! What was that thing and what was it good for?!’ Roger whined, indignantly folding his arms over his chest.

‘The feather duster, to show you why you should wear shoes outside,’ Brian simply answered, brushing a few pieces of grass off his plumeau.

‘Because my evil boyfriend could magically appear from out of nowhere to tickle me with a feather duster?’ Roger asked slightly indignantly, but Brian happily hummed in satisfied agreement.

‘Admit it, you deserved it for not listening to me,’ Brian told him, but Roger would not have been Roger if he had agreed with being reproved for something he had done.

‘I was never not listening to you!’ Roger objected.

‘Really? How come then that you aren’t wearing any shoes, whereas you told me you would put those clogs on?’ Brian asked him sternly, but the smug smile that formed on his partner’s lips made him realise that Roger had been thinking this over, and that the drummer would win this disagreement one way or another, even before Roger had uttered a single word.

‘I never told you I was going to wear them. I said, _‘I’ll see if I can find them,’_ Roger recited himself, and Brian, feeling where this was going, sighed deeply, which unfortunately only served as an encouragement for Roger to continue proving his right even more happily than before. ‘But guess what? I’m blind, so I can’t see anything at all. I therefore couldn’t see those clogs and went outside without them. Gotcha,’ he added brightly, obviously very satisfied with his own reasoning.

In the few seconds of silence that followed, in which Brian tried to come up with a response to Roger’s well thought-out argumentation, Roger’s smile only grew wider and the sparkle in his eyes intensified, so Brian decided to drop the conversation and let him win this round, convincing himself that seeing Roger being happy was worth losing this battle.

‘Roger Meddows Taylor, you are one sneaky little bastard,’ Brian indirectly gave in, running a hand through his lover’s tangled, uncombed locks of hair.

‘I’m not. You should just pay better attention to your choice of words,’ Roger told Brian smugly, the self-satisfied smile that tugged at the corners of his lips only growing wider when he felt the soft, feathery side of the plumeau connecting with his backside.

‘You better get that naughty bottom of yours inside the house, before I let you feel the other side of this tool,’ Brian said in a playful attempt to get his partner to move into the direction of their house, even though he should have known that his warning-slash-promise was doing the exact opposite.

‘Is that supposed to be a threat or an encouragement?’ Roger winked, and whereas Brian at first groaned in disbelief that he had managed to forget that Roger would only be in favour of such a plan (or at least in favour of teasing him with such a plan), he now simply joined Roger in his moment of naughtiness and entertainment.

‘It was supposed to be a threat, but I can change it into an encouragement if you like that better,’ Brian said, before he stepped a little closer to Roger, placing his hands on Roger’s waist. When Roger leant into his touch, he knew he could pull him closer, and while doing so, he placed a kiss on his boyfriend’s forehead. ‘You know what? You haven’t changed a bit, after all,’ the guitarist commented, nuzzling at Roger’s hair while the drummer threw his arms around Brian’s shoulders and buried his face in the crook between his neck and shoulder.

‘Of course not. I know you like me best this way,’ Roger told him with a bit of giggle.

‘No comment,’ Brian chuckled, which was enough for the both of them to know that Roger was right about his assumption – the drummer might have been driving Brian out of his mind with the return his indecent remarks, his problematic tendency to always escape from Brian’s watchful eye and end up in potentially dangerous or nerve-wracking situations, overall rebelliousness, but they also both knew that Brian secretly loved all of this deep down inside. He loved to see Roger finally being happy and comfortable with himself again, he loved to see him coming back to life again, and he loved to have his boyfriend back like he used to be. Even if this meant he would occasionally feel like he wanted to disappear into nothingness after a most shameless comment Roger had just made, or if he sometimes had to run through the house in cold sweat when Roger was nowhere to be found once again; Brian was willing to accept all of this, knowing these were signs his boyfriend was doing well.

Carefully detaching himself from Roger’s body again after a tight hug and the exchange of a few sloppy kisses, Brian said: ‘Now, let’s get back inside, I made us some tea.’

‘Ahw, do we have to go inside already?’ Roger pouted. ‘The weather is so out here nice!’ he objected, and while glancing around the sunlit garden, Brian had to admit that he was right – it was pleasantly warm and peaceful outside, and it would be a shame to spend this beautiful morning inside their house. And let’s be honest, who could deny the puppy eyes of the pretty blond drummer, who was standing barefooted in front of him in his light blue pyjamas, such an innocent request – or just anything at all, in general?

‘Well, I suppose we can have breakfast outside, if you’d like to. On one condition,’ Brian quickly added when Roger seemed to be a bit too enthusiastic about the plan.

‘And that is?’ Roger asked, now sounding slightly worried, but he was luckily soon able to smile again when Brian’s demand turned out to be totally doable.

‘You put on some shoes,’ Brian told him, running the tip of the feather duster he still held in hands along Roger’s bare feet, making the drummer emit a bit of a squeak. ‘Because really, going outside without anything on your feet while you can’t see where you’re walking isn’t a good idea, baby,’ the guitarist told him, and Roger nodded in understanding.

‘Alright. On one condition,’ Roger said in his turn, and though he couldn’t see it, he could instinctively feel the questioning expression Brian would pull off at him. ‘I’m _not_ putting on those dreadful clogs you told me to wear.’

A huff of laughter escaped Brian, who leant in to place one more quick kiss on his lover’s cheek. ‘Okay then, little diva, I’ll fetch you a pair of sneakers,’ Brian promised, placing his hand on the one Roger reached out to him, and together they made their way into their house again.


	2. Keys

Guiding Roger along the gravel path that led from the sidewalk next to the road all the way to their front door, was never exactly an easy task late at night; the only source of lightning, which was a modest distribution of lampposts on either side of the street, emitted a glow too poorly for Brian to even see where he was walking, let alone to check what Roger was doing with his feet. That the lighting in their residential area was dimmed down at night (probably as another shabby attempt of the city council to save money on energy) so much that one could not see five feet in front of one’s face, was common knowledge to Brian, who had noticed many times before that it was safer to trust his own instinct and senses than to rely on that poor glow of those damned streetlights. But whereas he had therefore gained experience in guiding Roger in the darkness of the early morning, or, more often, the obscurity of the late evening during the autumn months, he had always done this while being fully concentrated on his task of safely getting Roger out of the car and into their home. _This_ time, though, it was fair to say that Brian, as well as Roger, was rather… _distracted_.

The fact that they were both distracted at the same time, was no coincidence at all; just like it would come to no one’s surprise to find out that they were too focussed on each other, their boyfriend’s

Brian pulled the keys out of the back pocket of his trousers somewhere in between all of this, but just as he squinted his eyes to determine which one of the handful of keys was the one he needed to open the door, Roger, probably hearing the rattling sound of the keys, reached out his hand to take the little bundle of metal from Brian before his partner could even react to it.

‘I can do it,’ Roger said as to explain what he was planning to do with the newly acquired keys, sounding rather determined that he could, whereas Brian raised one eyebrow in doubt.

‘Are you sure? There’s a lot of keys, do you know which one goes for the front door?’ Brian asked. The light that shone through the window of the door enabled him to see the handful of keys Roger had stolen from him; and whereas he recognised the key by it being the only copper one among an ocean of silver keys, Roger of course was not going to recognise it by its colour. For him, the right key was somewhere in between a dozen which had roughly the same size and shape, including the key of their car, the back door, the garage, both their parents’ houses, as well as that of Freddie and John’s place. There was a remainder of about five keys which Brian guessed were used to open lockers or closets or doors from places he never went anymore, but to be really honest, he had absolutely no idea which purposes they served. He hadn’t used them in years, but as he was afraid he would need them once didn’t have them close at hand (not to even mention what he was afraid of would happen if he would throw them away), he elected to just keep them with him all the time, in case he ended up in front of one of those aforementioned lockers or doors. At the moment, this little practice proved to be somewhat unfortunate, given that it made it even harder for Roger to determine which key to use – not that Roger was willing to admit this, though.

‘Of course I know which key I need,’ Roger answered, as if he could not believe Brian just asked him that. In the dimly lit portal of their house, Brian could see him fiddling around with the handful of keys he had captured, until he eventually decided to go for a seemingly random key. Roger took a step forwards, smoothing his hand over the surface of their door until he had found the doorknob.

‘Here we are,’ Roger said pedantically, as if he had already proven to Brian that he could carry out the task of opening the door, whereas in face, he had yet to begin. Brian decided that it was probably better not to tell him that and patiently let Roger bring the first key up to the keyhole, failing to hold back a small smile of both adoration and smugness when it turned out, like he had predicted, that the key did not fit. He couldn’t help looking at Roger that way whenever he wanted to do something he simply couldn’t do anymore without eyesight; Roger had always been determined to , and Brian knew he should have known better than to think this would chance after Roger’s loss of vision. He was still as

Roger, who in the meantime had discovered that the key he was trying wasn’t going to work, was clumsily looking for a new contender. ‘Wait, I know it, it’s this one,’ Roger corrected himself, pulling out another key and bringing it up to the lock. He used the tip of it to find the small notch in which the key was supposed to fit, but again he didn’t succeed in pushing it inside.

‘Shall I do it?’ Brian proposed when he saw the well-known furrow forming between Roger’s eyebrows, expressing that he was either confused or frustrated by something – often a combination of both factors – but Roger wouldn’t hear of it.

‘No, I’ll manage. Just… gotta find that one key…’ he mumbled more to himself than to Brian, intently staring at the handful of keys as if it would make a difference for him while he felt the shape and size of a few more of the iron sticks. He eventually decided to give it another try, once again in vain, and during his attempt to find yet another key he may or may not have been using before, he almost dropped the cluster of keys on the stone ground beneath them. Brian was about to open his mouth to once again suggest that Roger could give him the keys and just let him do the job, but Roger was already on his way back to the lock, clumsy hands feeling for the lock and trying to work a key inside.

The sight of Roger sitting closely to the door and helplessly trying a dozen of keys in order to find the right one, suddenly made a long forgotten image pop up in Brian’s head. ‘This reminds me of all those times when you used to be drunk,’ Brian told his companion, who shortly looked up from the task he had burdened himself with.

‘God, I remember,’ Roger answered with a chuckle, which soon faded when he realised something else. ‘But now you’re not letting me drink anymore"

‘Hey, you’ve had a few sips of my wine!’ Brian defended himself. ‘And I know for a fact that Freddie and Mary gave you some of theirs as well when they thought I wasn’t looking,’ Brian said mildly accusingly towards both the giver and the receiver of the forbidden beverage, which still didn’t stop Roger from saying something Brian wasn’t wanting to hear.

‘Yeah, so I’ve had what, five sips of wine, maybe six if I’m lucky? You know I would’ve drunk that whole bottle if I would’ve been given the chance,’ Roger informed Brian.

‘Which is exactly why I instructed everyone to keep the alcohol away from your reach. You’re clumsy enough just being blind alone, dear,’ Brian chuckled.

‘Why, thank you!’ Roger replied quasi-indignantly; he knew Brian was right about him being very clumsy now that he was unable to see any of his surroundings, but he couldn’t help reproving Brian for calling him that.

‘Sorry, baby, but you know it’s true; being blind and drunk is bound to be a rather disastrous combination.’

‘We don’t know that for sure, though. They only way to see if you’re right is by trying it out.’

‘Well tried, you little fortune hunter, but all you’re going to get is a glass of milk before we head off to bed.’

‘Bed? Right away?’ Roger asked, disappointment glossing over the tiredness in his voice.

‘Babe, it’s almost one o’clock!’ the guitarist said.

‘Which is extraordinary early in comparison to how late I used to get home!’ Roger reminded him.

‘Technically speaking, we’re not home before we enter our house; as we’re currently standing in front of it, we’re not home,’ Brian reasoned, but he was speaking more to himself than to Roger. He knew by experience that Roger probably had stopped paying attention to him after the words _technically speaking_ , which was a warning that Brian was going to give him one of his infamous lectures. To catch Roger’s attention again, Brian added _:_ ‘And it might as well be three hours later before we’re inside if you continue to open the door at the speed you’re currently working with.’

‘I might as well continue to do this, so I don’t have to go to bed yet,’ Roger snickered while leisurely fiddling around with the handful of keys in search for a new one.

Brian sighed audibly – it was typically Roger to reason like that. ‘Babe, what is there to do at this point in time? No one’s awake, there’s nothing on TV, it’s too late to listen to music if we don’t want to have the police coming over for noise disturbance-’

‘But there’s you,’ Roger quietly interrupted him. ‘I don’t need to watch TV or listen to music or go anywhere now, but I also don’t want to go to sleep yet. I just want to be with you.’

‘You… want to be with me?’ Brian asked just as softly while looking at his boyfriend’s pale complexion.  It was as if Roger sensed that he was looking at him, though, because he swiftly looked away from him and focussed on his hands instead – they restlessly  continued to fiddle with the previously selected key, as if he needed something to do now that he sensed Brian was looking thoroughly at him.

Roger’s voice barely louder than a whisper while he explained: ‘We’ve been around other people all day and evening. I just… I’ve been longing all day to have you for myself for a little while.’

Brian felt a pang of guilt the moment he heard that, because it didn’t take more than half a second to realise that what Roger said was true; he had not exactly dedicated to Roger the amount of time and attention he normally would have liked to. He had been stressed since the moment they realised they had overslept that morning, after which he had quickly dropped Roger off at braille class. He had picked him up afterwards to rush back to the studio to lay his hands on the guitar solo of a new song, leaving Roger to sit by himself while Freddie, John and he had been bickering over irrelevant details. The party they had been to that evening had been the place where Brian had finally found some peace of mind again, but given that Roger had been one of the many people who had been aiming to get his attention, the guitarist hadn’t really dedicated much time to him there either. And now that he was listening to the ill-hidden hurt and disappointment Roger’s sleepy voice, he regretted this deeply.

Brian fumbled for a way to make up with him at this point in time, which fortunately didn’t take too long. His fingers enveloped Roger’s and he carefully helped him locate the lock and push the key into the keyhole, turn it around, and open the door.

‘So what if we would sit down on the sofa with a glass of milk and some biscuits, and we look over that song Cynthia translated into braille for you?’ Brian proposed warmly.

Roger looked up at him at last. ‘Right now?’ he asked, not having expected Brian to change his mind.

‘Considering how talkative and moveable you are, I believe there’s no use putting you in bed yet anyway, now is there?’ Brian assumed, which earned him a smile from Roger, who now stood up from his crouched position on the ground.

‘There’s never any use in putting me in bed,’ Roger said, and even in the half-darkness that surrounded them, Brian didn’t miss the cheeky smile on his face when he added: ‘Not for the goal of _sleeping_ , that is.’

‘Oh, get inside,’ Brian said as he pushed the door open and stuffed the keys in the back pocket of his trousers, but it soon turned out that this order was only making matters worse for him.

‘If only _you_ would get inside of-’

‘Don’t,’ Brian interrupted Roger just in time, but not for the goal of reprimanding him – quite the opposite, in fact. ‘Don’t get ahead of the schedule, dear. We’ll get to that afterwards,’ Brian said in a promising voice, his grin matching the one that instantly appeared on Roger’s face. The guitarist placed his hand on the small of Roger’s back, guiding his boyfriend inside their house to live up to the promises he had stated both directly and indirectly.


	3. Games

**Blinded By The Light: Games**

After having cleaned around all the rooms that were part of their small London residence, Brian finally allowed himself to put the dust cloth down on some random side table he passed on his way to the sofa, after which he let himself fall down on the couch with a heavy thud. He sighed in relief when the action of making himself comfortable on the sofa marked the end of a whole day of work; he had been busy with the household – cleaning, vacuuming, doing the laundry, changing the bed sheets – for hours and hours, so he was glad that it was finally all done for the upcoming week. It was a rainy Sunday afternoon, which was one of the only moments he ever had the time to get such tasks done; all other days were occupied with studio work, practicing music, Roger’s braille classes, and either Roger’s or his family randomly showing up, which was always well-meant, but which left little to no time for Brian to tackle the accumulation of dust and dirty laundry in their house. He therefore always made sure there were no appointments and that there was no one coming over on Sundays, so Roger could finally have a well-deserved day off and so that he could do some chores around the house.

But God, after having washed up an enormous stack of dishes that had built up over the course of at least three days, having washed and ironed and folded a week’s load of laundry, and having vacuumed and dusted all the rooms, Brian was starting to feel the tiredness sink in. Especially now that he was comfortably lying on the sofa, hands tucked under his head, and most of all, with no Roger – who was sitting at the kitchen table – buzzing around him, it seemed to Brian that it was getting more difficulty to keep his eyes open with every passing second. Maybe this unusually quiet moment made the perfect opportunity for the guitarist to just shortly close his eyes; perhaps he could just take a bit of a nap before Roger would even notice that he had fallen asleep.

To make sure Roger was indeed still sitting where Brian had last seen him, Brian propped himself up on his elbows and sat upright to peer through the small gap of space between the doorpost and the door that lead to the kitchen. He always left the door ajar if Roger was in another room than he was, so he could see what the drummer was doing. Right now, Roger was, as expected, sitting at the kitchen table; he had his fingers tightly clenched around the stylus in the palm of his left hand, his right index finger was slowly travelling along the lines of embossed printing, indicating that he was very concentrated on his homework. Way too busy with his homework to notice that I drifted off, Brian convinced himself as he soundlessly lay down again, curled his body up on the sofa and peacefully closed his eyes…

Of course, Brian should have known right away that these last couple of actions were too much to have asked for. As soon as he had shut his eyes and snuggled into the soft decorative pillows of their sofa, he heard the legs of a chair scratching along the tiled kitchen floor, followed by the sound of soft footsteps and the cracking noise of the doors of the pantry opening. Brian pressed his eyelids tighter together in an attempt to deny the activities that were currently going on in the kitchen, but when he heard the footstep nearing, he knew it was useless; Roger was coming towards the living room, to ask him something or to show something or to do anything else that would undoubtedly disturb Brian’s short moment of peace and quietness.

‘Brian, we should play a game!’ Roger chanted excitedly as he made his way into the living room, whereas the guitarist hardly managed to oppress a groan the moment he heard the word ‘game’. Ever since Roger had gotten blind, one of his main source of entertainment had been playing games – and though he knew Roger loved those, Brian was at the moment not exactly in the mood to play one of those daily recurring parlor games. Since there was only a limited range of games available in braille or that were in other ways adapted to the visually impaired, they always ended up playing the same ones: domino with raised dots, card games with numbers in braille, monopoly that had been altered to make every street, every building, every action and amount of money tangible, and so on. Right now, Roger was standing at the other side of the table with a medium-sized wooden box in his hand, announcing that he had already picked one of the games. Brian knew he could never say no to him in the end if Roger really wanted to do something with him, but he gave it a weak shot anyway.

‘Hm…’ Brian mumbled. ‘Have you already finished your homework?’ he tried in an attempt to direct the drummer back to the kitchen and leave him to sleep on the sofa.

‘Yes, I have, and also that for Tuesday and Wednesday,’ Roger told him, and Brian sighed inaudibly. Contrary to what everyone had been fearing when he first started his classes, Roger was remarkably enthusiastic about doing his braille homework on time. Though this was usually a good thing, Brian now thought it was a shame that he couldn’t use unfinished homework as an excuse to send Roger back to the kitchen. He fumbled for something else he could use  instead, but he couldn’t come up with anything right away. In the meanwhile, Roger took advantage of the silence that he left behind by trying to persuade him with his pleads.

‘Come on, Bri,’ Roger encouraged him, ‘you’ve been cleaning all morning, I’ve been making homework… We should do something fun now!’

 _It’s just what you call fun…_ Brian thought to himself, but then immediately felt guilty about it when he looked up to see his boyfriend looking at him in hopeful anticipation. Roger had been behaving so well all morning; he had quietly entertained himself by listening to the radio and making homework without disturbing him even once, knowing Brian had a lot of work to do. He had probably been working hard to get his homework done quickly, so he would be ready when Brian would be as well, and so they could spend the rest of the afternoon together. This realisation made it impossible for Brian to brush off Roger’s proposal to play a game, so he slightly reluctantly gave in.

‘Alright, what game do you have there?’ Brian asked as he rubbed his eyes, even managing to sound a little more interested this time, even though this state of being only lasted mere seconds.

‘Connect Four,’ Roger said excitedly as he got down on his knees next to the table and placed the box on the table leaf, whereas Brian wanted to bury his face underneath a pile of pillows when he heard those two words.

‘Can’t we play something else, baby? We’ve been playing this game so often lately,’ the guitarist tried, which was still a bit of an understatement; they had been playing Connect Four _endlessly_ , _tirelessly_ , _infinitely_ , and Brian was positive he would throw the damned game out of the nearest _window_ if he had to play it one more time.

‘Don’t you like this game? But it was a present from your father!’ Roger reminded him as he opened the box and carefully took out the wooden board Brian had come to dread so much over the past months. Surely, he appreciated the fact that his father, who was always trying to come up with little tools and devices to make Roger’s life more easy and fun, had given it to them; the story behind it was that Harold had seen the game in the showcase of a toyshop and got the clever idea of boring holes into the light-coloured wooden discs while leaving the dark-coloured disks intact, to make the distinction between them tangible for Roger. The receiver of the gift had loved the game since the moment he’d seen it (or felt it, for that matter), and so had Brian at first. But overtime, Roger had pulled this specific game out of the pantry numerous times a week, sometimes even numerous times a day, to the point where Brian could hardly _stand_ the game anymore right now.

But one glance at Roger, who had gotten down on his knees in front of the table and  happily shook the small round disks out of the box to divide them between them two, made Brian unable to tell him so. Roger, to whom something small like listening to the radio, sitting outside in the garden to run his hands over the grass and the flowers, or playing a simple game, was in fact the best available source of entertainment, deserved better than to have this little bit of fun being taken away from him because his partner wasn’t in the mood. Therefore, Brian forced himself get up, play the damned game and be enthusiastic about it, just to let Roger have the little bit of fun he deserved.

‘Of course I like it, dear,’ Brian said as cheerfully as he managed in his state of sleepiness, reluctantly pushing himself up on his elbows and letting his body slide off the couch to sit down across from Roger on the floor. ‘Are you taking the white disks again?’ he asked in an attempt to appear interested in the game Roger was setting out in front of them.

‘They could be purple with yellow dots on them, for all I know. But to answer your question, I’m taking the ones with the holes in them,’ Roger answered, and Brian couldn’t oppress a bit of a snicker. There were these moments every now and then when he would say or ask something involving eyesight, just out of habit, and Roger would always kindly yet wittily make sure to give him an answer that immediately made him realise that he was talking about pointless things or asking stupid questions.

‘Understood,’ Brian chuckled as he quickly rescued the discs Roger tried to shove in his direction, which threatened to fall off the table leaf. ‘Do you want to start?’ he asked, and Roger nodded enthusiastically. He sat upright on his knees, first extensively feeling at the wooden frame of the game, before letting the first disc fall into one of the rows, a slight frown on his concentrated face.

‘Your turn,’ Roger quietly announced, listening closely to hear where Brian dropped his piece, before feeling at the two places that had been filled up by a disc, and based on this analysis, he put his piece on top of Brian’s. Brian put his piece next to Roger’s, resulting in the drummer feeling for the position of the pieces and eventually letting it fall into its destined place. Brian was quick to react to this; both because he was able to actually _see_ the game in front of him and did not have to visualise the scene with every added piece, and because he was slowly starting to enjoy himself by simply looking at the movements of his boyfriend. Even though he hadn’t been in the mood to play the game when his boyfriend had first proposed it, he was beginning to realise how much he loved seeing Roger being fully concentrated and focussed on the game he was planning to win.

Brian’s sour and unamused expression changed into an ever-widening smile as he watched Roger completely living up to his goal of playing his favourite game with reason and rationality. Every time one of Brian’s dark brown pieces softly clicked against the one beneath it as it fell into its place, Roger move a little closer to the game board, frowning pensively as he trailed his fingers along the frame to feel for the distribution of the complete and the hollow discs. With a hollow disc between the thumb- and forefinger of his left hand, Roger completely worked out what Brian assumed had to be an updated image of the game in his head, given that he played pretty well; it might take a few minutes every time Roger had to consider what his next step was going to be, but after this, he was often able to make a well thought-out movement.

Brian in the meantime simply watched the process of Roger focussing deeply, taking mental notes on the game’s progress, and eventually smiling a little brighter to himself every time he let a disc fall into the place he had found for it. He seemed to be working so hard and enjoying himself so much, that Brian simply didn’t have the heart to put his disc down in a place where it would have formed a line of four and would therefore have handed the victory to him. Instead, he acted like he hadn’t seen it and put his chip down in a hole on the other side of the frame, almost hearing Roger sigh in relief when he discovered the mistake that could have been the end of the game and the dismissal of his intended victory. The drummer quickly filled up the still empty hole with one of his light-coloured discs, by doing so ensuring his chance of winning and making Brian smile fondly at his childlike excitement over the game. Even though Brian didn’t like the game himself, he couldn’t deny that watching Roger enjoy it was making it a lot more bearable.

He therefore played along without complaining, and most of all, without making it too hard for Roger; he would hate to spoil the drummer’s moment of fun by winning himself with the help of some kind of nasty, complicated technique. There were a few occasions where Brian saw a chance to pull if an intricate trick that Roger probably wouldn’t have detected, but knowing that his partner was so engaged in his favourite game, and most of all, that he, being blind, didn’t have the resources others had, made him decide against his own plan. Instead, he just placed the chips in somewhat random holes while letting Roger map out the well-found plan he seemed to be working out.

‘I think I’ve got you,’ Roger eventually announced with a more than satisfied smile.

‘Do you?’ Brian asked, trying not to let it show that he had been aware of this for quite some time, especially when you took into account not only the handful of movements that had passed, but also the amount of time between each one of them that it took Roger to restructure the new mental map with the location of all discs after each movement.

‘If I’m not mistaken, there’s a diagonal line of three hollow chips from the second-to-left bottom line to the middle,’ Roger said, his finger following the three spots he meant, both to point out his calculations and to see for himself if it worked. ‘There’s an empty space in the corner, and there’s a vertical four of four discs on the other side. If you put your chip in the corner, I’ll place mine on the stake of four, and if you put it there, I’ll put mine in the corner. So whatever you do, I’ll win.’

‘God, you’re right! How did I miss that?’ Brian asked with what he hoped was well-played surprise, given that Roger did not seem to question the sincerity of his wonder and instead smiled proudly.

‘Perhaps because you were too busy with whatever you were doing over here,’ Roger said while pointing to the other side of the frame. For a moment, Brian feared that Roger sensed that he had been letting him win (which would instantly ruin the drummer’s enjoyment), but he soon found that he didn’t; his comment hadn’t been an accusation, but really just a way to help him pinpoint where he had lost, so Brian could easily cover up with an excuse.

‘Yes, I was trying to form a row here, and I didn’t keep track of you well enough in the meanwhile, apparently,’ he quickly made up. ‘Anyway, very well done, baby.’

‘You can pick the next game. As a consolation prize,’ Roger told him as he held the framework upside down, the wooden pieces landing not only on the table, but also on the floor below.

‘To rub it in that I lost, you mean,’ Brian teased while reaching down to pick up the chips and placing them back in the box a little louder than necessary, just so Roger could hear that he was wrapping up the game; because surely, he wasn’t going to play the game he hated with a burning passion now that he had been offered a way out – and he knew exactly what they were going to play next.

‘Well, I know a fun game. It’s called, let’s lie down on the sofa, and whoever falls asleep first, wins,’ Brian told him as he let his body fall onto the sofa he had been lying on before, landing on the piece of furniture with a heavy thud to indicate that he was ready to play the game he had just proposed.

‘That isn’t a fun game at all,’ Roger brought in, collecting a few more wooden discs from the table.

 _Neither was yours,_ Brian thought to himself, but he immediately felt guilty for his inward cynicism; he had, whether he wanted to admit it or not, been having a nice time looking at Roger playing his favourite game, and seeing his boyfriend being happy, was something he would give everything for. A more friendly _‘You said I could choose, right?’_ was therefore the thing Brian said to Roger, who sulked a little, but who at the same time unenthusiastically gave in and crawled towards the sofa, hoisting himself up and clumsily lying down next to Brian. The guitarist rested his face against Roger’s back and enveloped his torso with his arms, slowly stroking Roger’s shoulders. Roger leant in to his touch and didn’t say a word, didn’t move a muscle; he just let Brian hold him, kiss him, and cherish him like only he could.

‘This is more my kind of game,’ Brian mumbled contentedly; he couldn’t help adoring spending some quiet time with Roger, simply lying in bed or slumping half over each other on the sofa. In their everyday life, there was no time to spend hours on said activities, which was why they had to resort to doing this on their scarce days off – that was, if Roger was willing to put aside his energetic nature and let Brian have his way for once. He seemed to be doing this right now; it might not have been completely voluntary, but he was quiet and silent, sticking to his promise of letting Brian pick the next game they were going to play.

‘Brian?’ Roger mumbled after a short silence, and Brian opened his eyes.

‘Yes, baby?’ Brian replied, raising his head slightly.

‘You can’t stand Connect Four, don’t you?’ Roger asked, a chuckle escaping him halfway the question; Brian couldn’t help doing the same.

‘I can’t indeed,’ Brian agreed as he put his head down on the pillow again. ‘But I’ll gladly play it with you if you like it so much,’ he added, pressing a kiss on Roger’s messy blond hair.

‘Thanks, Bri,’ Roger whispered, snuggling closer against him. ‘Then I will play your game as well now – but I can tell you beforehand, you’re going to lose again.’

A grin spread on Brian’s face as he heard that Roger thought he was going to win the game by falling asleep first. ‘Oh, I don’t think so. I’ve been working around the house all day; I’m going to win this one with ease.’

‘As if you’d ever win from after I spend three hours trying not to fall asleep right on top of my homework. Keep dreaming,’ Roger told him.

‘Dreaming is _exactly_ what I was planning to do, babe,’ Brian said, smiling at the playful poke this remark earned him. ‘And so should you, if you’re aiming to win. Sweet dreams,’ Brian whispered at his counterpart while intertwine his fingers with Roger’s, before they both wordlessly surrendered to the challenge the guitarist had proposed.


	4. Thunderstorm

When Brian woke up in the middle of what seemed to be a heavy thunderstorm, it was not so much  the ear-splitting noise of the first following thunderclap that caught his attention; instead, it was the sound of half-smothered sobs and choked-back tears that did. Despite the slumbering state of aftersleep he was still floating around in, it didn’t take Brian longer than half a second to trace the sound back to the only source he deemed possible considering the time and place – Roger.

Brian was quick to prop himself up on his hands, rub his eyes, and reach out a clumsy hand to fiddle for the switch of the nightlight. The source of light that always seemed to be way too bright whenever one had just woken up, emitted a poor circle of light around Brian’s nightstand, enabling him to read the time from the digital alarm clock next to his bed if he squinted his eyes. Brian could see that it was half past two, but he was too dazed to think about whether this was late or early, or whether they had been sleeping for long or not. It didn’t matter to him either; not now that a flash of light was quickly succeeded by a clap of thunder, which drew a helpless wail from the person lying next to him. Or well, lying… now that his eyes had gotten used to the dim light of the bedroom, he could see that Roger wasn’t lying on the bed the way he normally would; he had curled himself up below a tangle of sheets and duvets, knees pulled up to his chest and arms wrapped around them. Brian could hardly see his face; he had pulled the duvets up to his nose, leaving only his tearstained eyes visible for him to see.

The sight of this made a sting of guilt pass through Brian’s stomach – he felt awful for not having woken up earlier, right away when Roger needed him. Brian’s first instinct, to make up for having slept through the beginning of the thunderstorm and probably the many tears Roger had already shed as a result of this, was to spring right into action. But as much as Brian wanted to jump up, rip the duvets aside and throw his arms around his boyfriend, he knew this was a bad idea; Roger had to be approached cautiously at all times if one wanted to prevent scaring him even more, which was definitely the case in Brian’s situation.

Brian reached out a careful hand and placed it on Roger’s pyjama-clad shoulder. ‘You’re awake, darling, aren’t you? What’s wrong?’ Brian asked, even though determining that he wasn’t sleeping anymore, plus what exactly was troubling him, was both information Brian already possessed, especially when another loud growl of thunder made Roger flinch. It was just that he wanted to give Roger the chance to tell him what was wrong himself, but Roger didn’t seem to be in the mood to talk about it at all.

‘Nothing,’ Roger answered in a squeak, choking on transparent teardrops, and Brian sighed softly. He knew Roger wasn’t exactly fond of admitting his fears and always tried to cover them up as much as possible, but there was absolutely neither use nor need for. During the first thunderstorm they had experienced together somewhere years ago, it had only taken Brian five minutes of spending time together during a mildly aggressive thunderstorm to discover that it terrified Roger, and he had always told Roger that it was nothing to be ashamed of. Roger had seemed to be relieved that Brian didn’t think any less of him because of his fear of thunder, but still, he seemed uncomfortable to give in to his fears - even when Brian literally handed him all the words on a golden plate.

‘Roger, the lights are on; I can see that you’re crying. It’s the thunder and lightning, isn’t it?’

Without opening his eyes or bringing his head towards the direction of Brian’s voice, the drummer nodded heavily. ‘I can’t hear it coming,’ he added between sobs caused by another element of thunder, but Brian hardly noticed the display of the force of nature. He was too absorbed in Roger’s answer, which suddenly made him understand why he seemed to be even more afraid than usual – and which helped him feel even guiltier than before. Whereas Roger had never particularly liked thunder and lightning, he had always, like almost everyone, had the advantage of being able to tell when a next clap of thunder was going to assault the perfectly quiet atmosphere again. But now his eyes didn’t fulfil the function of detecting the lightning and predicting the thunder anymore, thus making the moment those ear-splitting noises would interrupt the silence a complete mystery to the drummer. Brian hadn’t realised yet that for Roger, who mainly feared the thunder, it was even more terrifying not to see the light flashes, than to experience both components of the thunderstorm.

‘Poor little thing, you must have been terrified… come here, it’s going to be alright,’ Brian offered, throwing the blankets aside and moving to the middle of the bed. Roger hesitantly followed his example; he carefully pushed the blankets aside and crawled closer to Brian, who felt overcome with guiltiness the moment he closed his arms around Roger’s skinny torso to find him shaking all over.

‘Baby, you’re trembling!’ Brian exclaimed, pulling the drummer’s shivery body closer against his and throwing an arm around him. ‘You should’ve woken me up!’ he informed him, even though he knew there was no use telling him this now. Still, Roger seemed to want to answer him, be it probably just to dismiss such an idea, but the heavy thunderclap that split the night prevented him from doing so, instead causing him to emit a helpless wail instead.

‘Bri, I’m scared! Please, you have to do something!’ Roger begged, clutching onto Brian’s nightshirt. Brian bit his bottom lip as he glanced down at the helpless looking boy who clamped onto him like a vice. He hated seeing Roger like this; he couldn’t stand having to watch him go through pain, fear, agony, or anything the like while he could do nothing but stay with him and tell him it was only temporary – something he couldn’t even say whenever Roger’s most frequently recurring torment, which was his visual impairment, was the source of the problems or fears. But at the same time, he was glad he was with Roger in such moments; he was glad to be around him, to be able to hold him, to hush him, to tell him it was alright, knowing these moments only made their connection stronger in the end.

‘Brian, I’m begging you, you- please stay here-‘ Roger’s voice was turning desperate by now, immediately bringing Brian back to reality.

‘I will. Hush, baby, of course I will,’ Brian whispered at his better half, his sentence interspersed by the sound of thunder. ‘Come here, I’m going to wrap you up in a blanket and lie you down again, and I’ll come lying next to you,’ he promised, pulling a fleece blanket he had found somewhere underneath the thick layer of covers out and manoeuvring it around Roger’s body, which he then covered with the duvet they shared between the two of them. When all of this had been said and done with the company of some necessary elements of thunder and lightning, Brian positioned himself against his partner again, capturing his torso between his arms and letting Roger nestle against him, his hands irremovably on the hem of Brian’s shirt and his faced buried in the crook between whose neck and shoulder. ‘I’ll tell you when the next light flash takes place, so you know when the thunder will follow, alright?’ Brian suggested, and he felt Roger’s head nodding against the shoulder he had buried his face into. Even though this suggestion was probably way too insufficient to make Roger’s worries disappear, the drummer was simply too caught up in fear and anxiety to protest; he probably understood as well that there was nothing else Brian could do apart from telling him when the flashes took place and hugging him tightly, especially the last of which he appreciated greatly. Therefore, Brian pulled Roger as closely against his body as possible, continuously rubbed his trembling back, and waited with eyes wide open for the first new lightning strike.

Soon enough, it turned out that he might as well have closed them; the light was sudden and intense enough for him to have seen it without having opened his eyes. In fact, it was so bright that he was sure he still would have seen it even if he had been blindfolded. Roger, on the other hand, stayed as still as he could in the given situation; there was nothing that indicated that he had seen or noticed anything of the bright light flash. Of course, Brian knew he should not have expected this, but it sometimes seemed so odd to him that Roger couldn’t even see something as obvious as the black pit of darkness suddenly being interrupted by light that was brighter than that of the average summer day. Even though Brian was completely used to Roger not seeing anything in everyday life, there were these small moments like this that made him wonder, be it for only a second, remembering the promise he had made.

‘That was a flash,’ Brian informed Roger, feeling the younger man’s muscles tense against his embrace, preparing himself for the inevitable moment of the thunderclap that was going to follow way too soon. ‘ One, two, thr-’

Brian did not even get the chance to finish the last word; he was interrupted by the noise of thunder, loud enough to make him cut off his attempt to count, and, most of all, loud enough to make Roger jump right up again with a helpless scream.

‘Brian!’ Roger called his name in terror, clutching onto him as if he was his last hope of survival.

‘Shhh… baby, there’s nothing wrong. It’s just pretty close, that’s all,’ Brian said, receiving just enough time to gently lay a very shaky Roger down on the mattress again before a new light flash caught his attention. ‘Another light flash,’ he announced, and his attempt to count the second between the lightning and thunder once again did not last longer than about two and a half second. The thunderstorm seemed to be located right above their part of town at the moment, but for the sake of the little emotional stability left in his boyfriend’s worried mind, it did not seem like a good idea to Brian to share this information with him. Instead, he simply held him, hushed him, wiped his face clean of tears, told him it was going to be alright, informed him of any new light flashes and counted the seconds between the both components of the thunderstorm. Even though Roger cringed and buried his face deeper into the crook of Brian’s neck and shoulder every time another unexpected thunderclap shook them up, the crying eventually died out after a dozen of minutes. The eternal trembling of his body and clasping of his restless hands morphed into little shocks and jolts whenever a particularly loud thunderclap struck them by surprise, and Roger in the end even counted along with Brian in that shaky, high-pitched voice of his.

‘Five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven…’ Both Brian and Roger stopped counting when the long-awaited noise interrupted their counting, waiting for the sound to pass. Brian was happy to find that Roger hardly reacted to it anymore; his little trick of holding him tightly and insistently counting the seconds between both components of the thunderstorm seemed to be paying off. The drummer still looked somewhat fragile with his pale skin and his eyes slightly red from the many tears he had shed, but he unmistakably seemed to feel better now that Brian’s body, words, and overall presence all worked together to guard him from his fear of the force of nature that was currently ruling the world both in- and outside the bedroom. Or actually, to be honest, Brian feared that it was already losing its strength; the sound of thunder was getting weaker

‘Very good,’ Brian praised him when Roger hardly gave a single sign of shock or discomfort at the following noise, and he gave his boyfriend a comforting rub over his hair, soothingly stroking Roger’s back. The drummer finally allowed himself to relax into his touch, which earned him a kiss on his forehead and another compliment.

‘You’re doing so well,’ Brian praised the boy in his arms, who smiled insecurely at him with closed eyes and unclenched fingers, making Brian believe that he might need another consolation. ‘The thunderstorm is fading away. It’s about four kilometres away by now.’

‘How can you tell?’ Roger asked attentively, which seemed to be a good sign to Brian; previously, his comforting statements had either been met with worried replies or with no answer at all, so the fact that Roger was actually asking him something again, seemed like a good sign to the guitarist, even though he knew Roger probably couldn’t really care for the mathematical side of his answer. He still tried to give it a shot, though; Roger’s curiosity should be rewarded with an answer, and honestly, he would not have been Brian May if he hadn’t been willing to talk about science.

‘Sound travels one kilometre every three point six seconds, assuming the temperature is around twenty-one degrees; anything higher enables sound waves to travel faster, anything below makes them move slower,’ Brian started, before realising that Roger probably was not exactly thrilled to be lectured in physics, especially not at this point in time. ‘Anyway,  the last time we counted, there were twelve seconds between thunder and lightning. You just divide twelve by three point six, which is a little under four, meaning that the thunder is roughly four kilometres away.’

A growl of thunder was audible in the distance, but Roger seemed too caught up in the answer to care. ‘How do you know that?’ he eventually asked pensively, and a small smile started playing around Brian’s lips.

‘I’m an astrophysicist,’ Brian reminded him, and Roger hardly needed a second to come up with an answer that was unexpected, witty, and most of all, so very _Roger_.

‘I didn’t know there was thunder and lightning in outer space,’ he replied, and Brian snickered.

‘There’s not. It’s just that I’m also secretly a geographer,’ Brian said, pulling the duvet that threatened to slip away from Roger’s body back into place, before adding: ‘And an undercover professional boyfriend consoler.’

‘If that last thing is supposed to be a secret, you’re bad at hiding things,’ Roger whispered with an insecure smile, and Brian felt his heart melt at this confession, especially in combination with the way Roger comfortingly rested his head against his shoulder as a sign of trust. He loved moments like this; when, after an intense moment of sadness or anxiety that had emotionally taken a lot from the both of them, the sweet reward of feeling closer than ever to each other sank in. It felt lovely, it felt like love in its purest form; it was like the clouds moved aside to make place for the sunshine.

Brian glanced down to take a look at his boyfriend, who now looked much more comfortable than he had been when he had first laid his eye on him after he had woken up; his body was less tensed, the red circles around is eyes had disappeared, and there was even a small smile playing around his lips if you looked closely enough. It was faint and barely visible, but it certainly was there, and it was all Brian needed to realise just how badly he loved seeing Roger being happy.

‘If only _you_ were bad at hiding things – like that pretty smile, for example, I’d like to see more of that,’ Brian said as he crushed Roger into a tight embrace, kissing his face all over. The guitarist was rewarded with a broader smile from his partner, and, when he pulled away, with a chaste but loving kiss that was probably supposed to go on his lips, but which ended up just below his nose as a result of Roger’s lack of vision. A clumsy second attempt to put the kiss where it belonged ended up at the left corner of Brian’s lips, a third one on his bottom lip, and they unanimously decided that this was probably the best Brian was going to get at this point in time, especially given that Roger was drowsy and very much in need of sleep.

Brian therefore reached over to switch of the nightlight, and Roger could tell by just the feeling of him shifting to the other side, that it was time to try and fall asleep again.

‘Go back to sleep, babe,’ Brian whispered when he had dimmed the lights, but just when he wanted to lie down again and nuzzle at Rogers hair again, the drummer looked up in his direction. Brian could see the gleam of insecurity in Roger’s eyes when a  faint lightning strike enlightened the room for a second, enabling the guitarist to see his pale face.

‘But the thunder hasn’t passed yet,’ Roger whispered back at him, and Brian habitually nodded in understanding; even though Roger couldn’t see this, he could feel the movement of Brian’s head against his hair.

‘The thunder might take another while to completely fade out,’ Brian said, and instantly added: ‘But I’ll be holding you all the while, of course. I won’t be going anywhere.’

‘You couldn’t go anywhere even if you wanted to,’ Roger whispered, and before Brian could even think about what he meant by this, he added: ‘I’d find you instantly; you’re bad at hiding, after all.’

Brian rolled his eyes, inwardly wondering how he had managed to not have seen this coming. ‘Oh, aren’t we being clever tonight…’ he chuckled to make his invisible movement apparent to Roger. ‘Go to sleep, or else I’ll show you how good I am at hiding by tucking away your cigarettes tomorrow,’ he threatened, even though he knew Roger needed no such threats to try and fall asleep; he was so tired that he in fact couldn’t do more than faintly humming in protest against such an idea, after which he soon drifted off again, the thunder in the background no longer bothering him now that he had Brian to guard him from it.


	5. Sandy

_The inspiration for this fic comes from Sandy, my friend Lucas’ beloved Labrador and ‘partner in crime,’ as they have been found guilty of breaking lots of glasses and vases together over the course of the last nine years._

‘Sandy? Saaandy, where are you?’

Roger was sitting cross-legged on the carpet in the living room, listening intensely to determine the location of the Labrador by the ticking sound her paws made on the wooden floor as she ran around the room. The guide dog was usually very serious in her task of safely leading Roger through the invisible obstacles of his day, but when they got home after a long day of work, it took no more than the sight of her favourite yellow and orange tennis ball to drop her serious attitude and instead be right at Roger’s feet, panting and wagging her tail like an overexcited puppy. Brian always said that this was why they formed such a good pair – they could both be quiet, serious, and focussed when necessary, but once the front door fell shut behind them at the end of the day, both Roger and Sandy were outgoing and playful like only they could be.

This was exactly why now, after a long day of studio work, Roger found himself sitting on the floor and throwing Sandy’s tennis ball around the living room, listening with a smile to the sound of her paws scratching over the wooden floor as she hurried after her favourite toy. At the sound of his voice, she suddenly stopped and turned around to walk back to her owner, the tennis ball clenched between her jaws.

‘Good girl!’ Roger said when he could sense her standing in front of her, reaching out a hand to pet the top of her head, after which he held his hand out below her mouth. ‘Give me the ball, Sandy. Let go,’ he said, feeling the dog bowing her head down and placing the ball right on front of his crossed legs with a soft thud. Roger picked it up and raised his hand behind his hear, knowing by experience – that was, by Brian having described the sight to him – how Sandy would stand utterly still whenever he did this, watching closely to see in which direction he was going to throw the ball. He tossed the ball across the room, a wide smile forming on his face when Sandy enthusiastically ran after it and caught it soon after. After some encouragement, she brought the ball back again so Roger could repeat the toss. Roger picked up the ball and threw it in the opposite direction this time, to keep the game interesting for Sandy.

‘Come on, Sandy!’ he encouraged his dog, but the smile on his face soon dropped and was exchanged for an expression close to terror when the ticking of Sandy’s paws was suddenly overpowered by that of a loud clash, followed by the noise of something falling on the floor and shattering into what sounded like a million pieces. Roger froze in shock at the sudden and unexpected ear-shattering noise, unable to move a single muscle in his body for a handful of seconds. He had no idea _what_ he had hit, but _that_ he had hit something seemed more than obvious to him – and not _only_ to him, it seemed.

‘Roger, what was that?’

Roger felt all the colour draining out of his face at the sound of Brian’s voice, calm as usual, but with an audible touch of alarm right now. His heart pounded against his chest at just the prospect of Brian finding out that he had thrown a tennis ball into a glass, a vase, a bowl, or whatever the breakable item had been. Roger knew he should’ve known better than to throw a ball inside their living room, especially now that he couldn’t see any of his surroundings, and he feared Brian was going to be mad or disappointed in him for having done so anyway against better judgement.

‘Nothing!’ Roger quickly answered, hoping Brian, who was doing the dishes in the kitchen, wouldn’t come check on him anywhere soon, so that he might get the chance to clean up the mess he had made. He knew it would be naive to just stuff away the remains of the glass, stone, or china and expect Brian to never find out about it; but the alternative of telling Brian about what he had done, didn’t appeal to him either. He didn’t get a lot of time to think about whether or not, and if, how, he should break the news to Brian; he heard Sandy walking closer to the place he assumed the chaos was at, sniffing at it in curiosity.

‘Sandy, no!’ Roger hissed and hastily crawled towards the epicentre of shards, pushing his dog back to protect her from the mess she didn’t realise formed a threat to her. ‘Sandy, go to your cage,’ Roger whispered between clenched teeth. He couldn’t determine if she was heading off to the place he had told her to go to, but he heard her footsteps going the opposite direction of the one he had thrown the ball in, so he assumed she was listening to him.

Now that Sandy was out of the way, Roger decided to start working on tidying up the thing he had broken. He slowly moved closer to the spot on all fours and used his fingertips to determine the exact location. He frowned slightly when he couldn’t find any of the shards he expected to encounter on his way, and placed his hands forwards instead of only feeling around with the tips of his fingers. Soon, though, he wished he hadn’t, when the sharp, stinging pain of shattered glass settling into the palms of his hands washed over him, and he only just managed to bite down his bottom lip to oppress a cry of pain and a string or curses. His first instinct was to pull his hands back, but just when he did that, he heard Brian calling out to him again.

‘Roger, are you sure everything is alright?’

Roger heard the door of the kitchen opening and his boyfriend’s footsteps nearing. He cursed inwardly and decided that he had to pull through if he didn’t want Brian to find out about the mistake he had made right there and right then. He tried to quickly shove away the remains of whatever he had shattered into pieces, which unfortunately only caused the shards to settle deeper into the skin of his hands. Biting down his bottom lip in pain again, he pulled away from the epicentre of glass and tried to remove the devilishly painful splinters with his fingernails.

‘You’ve suddenly fallen awfully quiet-’ Brian started, after which the same happened to himself for a moment when his partner, who was sitting on the floor and tried to pluck the pieces of broken glass out of his hands, caught his eyes. ‘Roger, you’re bleeding!’

‘It’s nothing, nothing to worry about,’ Roger hastily answered as he turned away from the direction of the kitchen, and, with that, he hoped also from his boyfriend in an attempt to brush him off. Unfortunately, the opposite happened; he could hear Brian approaching him by the sound of his footsteps on the carpet, and Roger knew there was no time to try and hide the chaos from his boyfriend, certainly not now that Brian crouched down next to him.

‘There is, both your hands are bleeding! What happened?’ Brian asked in sincere concern, and Roger could feel his hands being picked up, fingertips tracing the palms that Brian had turned upwards to get a better view of. Roger held his breath, praying that Brian would be too focussed on the damage on his hands and removing the pieces of broken glass from his skin to see whatever he had broken by throwing Sandy’s tennis ball across the room, but it came to no surprise to him that Brian had already seen it – his partner was too observant to ever miss anything.

‘Did you cut yourself on those shards? Did you break that vase?’ Brian asked him. Contrary to what he had been fearing, it sounded nowhere near accusatorily, but Roger still felt the need to ask him not to be too hard on him.

‘Please don’t be mad at me,’ Roger whispered. ‘I’ll- I’ll just clean it up,’ he proposed as he reached out towards the broken glass again, but Brian caught his fingers before they could even determine the location of the potentially dangerous remains of the vase – which was probably a good thing, considering the events of just two minutes ago.

‘No no no, leave that to me,’ Brian told him sternly, after which he exchanged his strict voice for a much softer one. ‘And of course I’m not mad at you; I know you never meant to break anything,’ Brian comforted him, before Roger heard him standing up from the floor and felt two strong hands beneath his armpits pulling him along.

‘Come, let’s go to the kitchen to do something about these cuts,’ Brian proposed as he heaved Roger of the ground. Roger simply let him – he was too overcome with the shock of having broken something, the pain of having cut himself on the shards, and the fear of what was going to happen next, to protest against the plan. He let Brian help him on his feet and felt him putting one hand on his back, while the other one enclosed both his wrists. ‘Careful, babe, you’re dripping blood on the carpet,’ Brian told him as to explain why he pushed the palms of Roger’s hands upwards again.

‘Sorry,’ Roger squeaked, but Brian was naturally having none of it; he told him there was nothing to be sorry for while he guided him to the kitchen as patiently and carefully as only he could. Step for step, Roger moved towards the kitchen, careful not to spill any blood on the floor beneath him. He eventually ended up standing in front of what he assumed was the countertop, where Brian grabbed a washcloth out of one of the cupboards and soaked it under the stream of water that spilled from the tap, before he started focussing on him.

‘Alight, let’s roll up your sleeves first…’ Brian announced. Roger could feel Brian’s lanky body pressing against his back while he pulled the white and blue-striped fabric of his shirt back to his elbows. ‘And now I’m going to take your hands and put them under the tap, to rinse off the blood,’ Brian explained. Roger could feel the guitarist’s arms slip closely around his sides, his long, thin fingers enclosing his wrists and bringing them together in the sink. Brian carefully tugged his hands, with the palms still turned upwards, under the steam of water that spilled from the tap; fingers first, to get Roger used to the cold water, after which he pulled the palms of his hands under the stream.

‘Mmmh!’ A helpless hum escaped Roger when the open skin of his hand came in contact with the water. He tried to pull his hands away, but the gentle yet firm grip of Brian’s fingers around his wrists kept them right in place. ‘Brian, it hurts!’ Roger mewled in protest, but his partner didn’t let him go.

‘I know,’ Brian sighed compassionately. ‘I know it hurts, but I have to clean these cuts. Clench your teeth together, baby,’ Brian whispered in his ear, after which he pressed his lips against the side of his boyfriend’s head. Roger, sensing that his partner was determined about cleaning the wounds, shut his eyes tightly and attempted not to focus on the shockingly cold sensation of ice cold water streaming into the cuts of his hand, as far as that was possible. He wished for any kind of distraction from the water, but soon came to realise that ‘any kind’ had not been the right thing to pray for, given that Brian’s fingers rubbing the skin clean with a soaked piece of cloth turned out to be even more painful than just the water coming in touch with the problem area. Roger hissed through clenched teeth to express his dissatisfaction about the necessary but painful treatment, and Brian in his turn nuzzled at his blond locks of hair while rinsing away the blood.

‘It’s okay, you’re being very brave,’ Brian told him. ‘Do you feel any splinters in your hands?’ he asked, and Roger was happy to find that he could answer that question with a solid ‘no’. He had ended up with glass in his hands before, and remembered that the pain of the small but devilishly sharp pieces being taken out of the skin with the help of a pair of alcohol-drenched tweezers, was even worse than simply having his hands being held under ice cold water for what felt like hours but could not possibly have been longer than two minutes.

Roger assumed that Brian eventually deemed his hands to be clean when he turned off the tap and carefully spun him around. Roger, knowing by experience from previous incidents that this meant he had to sit on the countertop to make it easier for Brian to finish his work, habitually wanted to push himself up on his hands, but was prevented from doing so by his boyfriend right in time.

‘Careful! Let’s not use your hands, babe,’ Brian said, and Roger nodded weakly, suddenly realising that this was indeed not the best time to let the bleeding palms of his hands touch the countertop. He felt Brian’s slender fingers closing around both his sides, lifting him off the floor and sitting him down on the countertop.

‘So, let’s see if we have a roll of bandage somewhere here,’ Brian said in his ever-gentle voice, the sound of a door opening and products being moved around making Roger understand that Brian had dived into one of the cupboards. ‘I suppose I can’t persuade you to let me clean your hands with medical alcohol?’ Brian assumed during his quest, which the drummer confirmed with a feverish shaking of his head; after yet another incident that included hurting himself, Roger wasn’t looking forwards to going through the  painful corrosive burn he knew the medical alcohol was going to leave behind on open skin. Brian briefly mentioned that it was better to disinfect the cuts, but luckily he didn’t elaborate when Roger told him he didn’t want to be treated with medical alcohol this time. When the cupboard was closed, Roger was relieved to indeed only hear the sound of a plastic bag being opened and a crumpled roll of bandage being taken out, instead of that of the well-known bottle of alcohol being put down on the countertop as well.

‘Can you turn your palms towards me, Roger?’ Brian asked. ‘I will only tie off the cuts; I won’t use anything to clean,’ he clarified. Roger obeyed a little hesitantly, enabling Brian to carefully drape a thick layer of the thin, white fabric around his still slightly twitching hands.

‘Another bandage for your collection,’ Brian said with a bit of a sigh, and Roger blushed slightly. He could sense by the stillness of Brian’s hands that he was intently studying his somewhat battered-looking body. The time of his visual impairment being so strange and new that it caused him to seriously injure himself on an almost weekly basis was long gone, but they both knew that the minor accidents seemed to have come to stay. Throughout his body, there were always little signs of physical incidents; bruises on his hip from walking into the side of the rectangular dining table, a grazed knee as a result of tripping over something that had been in his way, red and slightly swollen fingertips from touching cups of tea, hot utensils, and radiators, sore elbows from bumping them against the wooden armrests of their dining chairs, plasters covering up all remaining incidents that had led to little wounds and painful grazes. The drummer knew it was probably going to be like that for quite a long time, but he hardly minded it, knowing that it was all part of the process – and, of course, knowing Brian would always be around to patch up whatever needed to be patched up.

‘So, that’s done,’ Brian said as he had laid his hands on the last little spots that needed to be covered. Roger received a soft pat on both of his still outstretched hands, before he was carefully tugged off the countertop and put back on his feet again by Brian, who took advantage of his still slightly dazed state of being by pressing a quick peck on his cheek.

‘Are you alright? Does it still hurt?’ Brian asked, and Roger shook his head weakly. When Brian gave his cheek a few more kisses and comfortingly rubbed over his back, Roger knew he didn’t have to fear about him being angry at him – and that it was silly to think that someone as gentle, kind, and understanding as Brian would ever be.

‘Thank you, Bri,’ Roger said as he stretched out on the tip of his toes, pressing his lips against what ended up to be the left side of Brian’s jaw. ‘And sorry again for breaking… breaking whatever that thing was,’ he said, his voice trailing down.

‘It was a vase, and it doesn’t matter. Really, it doesn’t,’ Brian insisted. ‘Just please tell me next time you break something, because I don’t want you to hurt yourself again.’

‘I will,’ Roger promised. ‘But I was… afraid you would be mad at me,’ Roger admitted shyly.

‘Darling, of course I wouldn’t be mad at you! I know you didn’t mean to break it,’ Brian soothed.

‘But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s still broken,’ Roger mumbled.

‘Which my fault, honestly; I shouldn’t’ve let you play inside the house with Sandy,’ Brian answered. ‘Speaking of Sandy… I think we better go to the living room to clean up the shards. And with we, I mean _I_ – because I don’t want these hands anywhere near potentially dangerous items for the upcoming time,’ Brian told him, before he reached out towards what sounded to Roger like the metal tin they preserved their biscuits in. He turned out to be right – Brian pressed a biscuit in both of his hands with the message that they were ‘to recover from the shock, and to keep his hands off anything else but these cookies’. Even though Roger wasn’t exactly feeling hungry after the incident, he was relieved that he didn’t have to _literally_ blindly gather the pieces of the vase he had hit.  

‘I told Sandy to go to her cage. I couldn’t check if she went there, but she seemed to walk away from the shards, so that was a good sign,’ Roger remembered while he followed Brian to the living room.

‘She went to her cage, it seems, given that she’s still sitting there. Such a good dog we have,’ Brian said contentedly. ‘Now, you’re going to sit on the couch, and I’ll clean up the shards,’ he added. Roger nodded and found his way to the place he had been assigned to sit, curling up on the left side of the sofa and toying around with the biscuits he had been given. He listened to the sound of Brian walking out of the room and returning with what he assumed was a dustpan and brush, and he felt himself being unable to stop feeling guilty for having broken something while he listened to the broken glass being swept into the dustpan. Even though Brian said it didn’t matter, he still felt like it did – he felt stupid for having played with Sandy so carelessly inside the house, knowing full well that had had to be careful with the for him invisible surroundings. Especially when he remembered having swept a mug off the table only a week ago, he realised he shouldn’t have been stupid enough to think it was possible to safely throw Sandy’s tennis ball across the room.

‘I’m sorry, Brian,’ Roger mumbled gloomily once again, uneasily fiddling around with the bandage that constricted his hands.

‘Darling, _really_ , it’s okay. It’s only a glass vase – all I care about is that you didn’t seriously injure yourself,’ Brian answered. Roger nodded, like he knew he was expected to, but his heart wasn’t in it. He stared somewhat lifelessly at his lap, until the sound of the brush sweeping the floor was joined by the soft ticking of Sandy’s paws on the wooden floor.

Brian was quicker to react than he was. ‘Sandy, did I tell you you could get out of your cage yet?’ Brian asked, sounding a bit surprised by this unauthorised act of the otherwise always obedient guide dog, especially when she ignored him when he told her to go back to where she belonged. Roger heard her paws on the carpet, and he knew she was bound to be somewhere close to him – what he hadn’t expected, though, was that she jumped right next to him on the couch.

‘Sandy!’ Roger exclaimed, more out of surprise than anything else – he surely didn’t mind it that his pet joined him on the sofa, but he knew that Brian didn’t want her on the furniture. ‘Sandy, you know you can’t go on the sofa…’ Roger tried, but his voice trailed down when the Labrador put her front paws on his upper leg, leant forwards to him, and gently started licking his right cheek with the tip of her tongue in an almost soothing way. A short silence fell into the room, which was eventually broken by Brian, who stood up and walked over to the couch.

‘Look at that, such a sensible dog we have!’ Brian said, crouching down in front of his partner and the dog, which he petted lovingly while she continued her business.

‘The trainer told me dogs can feel it when you’re sad,’ Roger whispered while Sandy continued to gently drag her tongue along his cheek. ‘I just didn’t imagine her to sense it his well,’ Roger said with a small smile, then abruptly shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, she should go off the couch. Sandy?’ he addressed the dog sternly, but Brian interrupted him.

‘She can go on the sofa if it is to comfort you, but she has to know that that pretty face of yours belongs to me and to me alone,’ Brian said, and Roger soon felt his partner’s slender fingers cupping his face and pressing his lips against his. Roger closed his eyes and relaxed into the touch of Brian’s soft fingertips, the warmth of his lips on his own, the physical closeness that never failed to make him feel safe. He kissed him back with the same tenderness as Brian was treating him with, inwardly praying the moment would last forever.

Before too long, though, they were interrupted by their dog, which they suddenly realised they had put aside the moment Brian had suddenly claimed all of Roger’s attention by bending over him and kissing him. Sandy probably wanted to put the spotlights back on her, because she started yelping softly yet agonisingly, a high, squeaking sound that never failed to catch the attention of her owner, simply because Roger couldn’t bear hearing his dog emitting miserable sounds like these.

Sandy got her way; Roger indeed pulled away from Brian and looked in the direction he assumed his pet was at the moment. ‘Sandy? What’s wrong, Sandy?’ Roger asked, seeming especially concerned when he heard her jumping off the couch, her paws making a dull sound when they connected with the carpet next to the sofa. But when he heard what he assumed was the tennis ball they had been playing with bouncing on the carpet, Roger knew he didn’t have to worry, and he hardly needed Brian to tell him what Sandy was most likely to be looking for.

‘I believe Sandy isn’t done playing yet. Do you want to go outside with her?’ Brian asked, and Roger nodded with the first real smile since the moment of the incident with the vase. The weather was fine, they had a modest but practical backyard where he could play with Sandy, and most of all – the fences and bushes that surrounded their garden were a lot less likely to shatter into pieces than the glassware in their living room.

‘Are you coming, too?’ Roger asked hopefully, flashing a begging glance in Brian’s direction. His partner was quiet for a moment, but Roger knew he had won him over when Brian crouched down to pick up the ball, which in its turn made Sandy bark and wiggle her tail in excitement.

‘How could I possibly resist two pairs of puppy eyes looking at me in expectation?’ Brian chuckled, offering Roger a hand to help him get off the sofa. Sandy panted and spun around a few times in excitement when she understood that both her owners were going to play with her now. ‘Come on, Sandy, let’s go to the backyard!’ Brian said to the dog, who took a sprint to the kitchen – Sandy loved playing in the garden, and she knew the way to it better than any other place.

‘Hold on, Roger,’ Brian said when his boyfriend wanted to follow their pet’s example of rushing off to the garden. ‘You have to understand that I’m not letting you go with breaking that vase just like that.’

‘Do you want me to buy you a new one?’ Roger guessed, but Brian dismissed this idea and instead intertwined his fingers with Roger’s.

‘No, something way worse,’ Brian said, but the chuckle in his voice betrayed him before he had even spoken the consequence he had come up with. ‘I’m going to be holding your hand and stay by your side for the rest of the day, to prevent you from hurting yourself again.’

‘Such awful punishment,’ Roger agreed with a smile, stretching on his tiptoes to press a long-lasting kiss on Brian’s cheek, only breaking away when an excited bark from Sandy turned his attention away from his boyfriend.

‘Come, we better follow her, before she tries to open the back door herself and breaks the glass of it while doing so,’ Brian said, giving his lover’s bandaged hand a bit of a squeeze before they followed the way the Labrador had laid out for them.


	6. Train

Brian shivered when the opening doors filled the close to deserted train carriage with cold February air. He craned his neck to look mildly accusingly at the lonesome passenger that stepped inside the vehicle, impatiently waiting for the man to walk past, and mainly, for the automatic doors to slide towards each other again. He had lost track of time long ago, but judging by the ink black colour of the sky outside the rectangular windows of the train, they had exchanged the dusky afternoon for an even darker evening quite a while ago. Another time, another time, another place, he would have used pulled the sleeve of his coat up to glance at the watch on his right wrist. But right now, this action was simply out of question, considering the fact that this was the arm he had tightly wrapped around his sleeping partner’s torso. After a long day of studio work, it had taken Roger no more than ten minutes of sitting next to Brian (leaning against, that was) in the quiet train compartment to finally give into the sleepiness he had been fighting against for hours.

For this reason, the last thing Brian wanted was to wake him up by an unexpected movement, so all he did was using his hand, which was resting on Roger’s ribcage, to tuck his scarf a little tighter into his coat in order to protect him from the intruding cold. He then proceeded to carefully drag the zipper up, his heart skipping a beat when this caused Roger to change his position a bit, but he was quickly able to catch his breath again when the drummer soundlessly continued sleeping after having squished his cheek a little closer against Brian’s shoulder.

Contentedly, Brian glanced out of the window, smiling at the reflection of their bodies in the dusty windows, before glancing down at his lover again. Roger always looked so peaceful in his sleep; away from the sometimes torturing reality of being blind that contradicted greatly with his nevertheless bight, cheery, and energetic personality. While being awake, these sides that both played such a large part of his everyday life clashed constantly; but as he was asleep, he finally seemed to find rest – not only physically, but also mentally. In his sleep, his visual impairment couldn’t haunt him, his brightness and energetic nature (and the expectations these had created) couldn’t follow him. Sleeping seemed to be the only opportunity for Roger to truly relax and let go of the everyday situation, so Brian did everything that was within his power to allow him this moment of rest.

But whereas he was in charge of his own movements and sounds, Brian simply could not control the actions of the few but certainly present people around him. This was something he deeply regretted the moment a broad, middle-aged, overweight, and incredibly loudly speaking man in a too tight fitting public service uniform stepped into their compartment to check the train tickets of the handful of people present in the vehicle. Brian listened with a frown to the loud, low sound that was the man’s voice, only to conclude that he wasn’t toning it down, but that he instead seemed to speak louder the closer he got to them. The guitarist coughed meaningfully in an attempt to make him understand that he should watch his voice, but this guy didn’t seem to be one to recognise subtle gestures and signs; he mindlessly continued speaking at maximum volume, even though Brian could sense that he wasn’t the only one who didn’t exactly enjoy practically being _screamed_ at. He flashed a nervous glanced at the drummer, who was still soundlessly sleeping against his shoulder, and he realised all too well that the conductor and his loud behaviour were forming a serious threat to Roger’s peaceful state of mind. Unfortunately, all he could do was pull him a little closer and pray that he wouldn’t wake up anywhere soon as the man approached.

‘Good evening gentlemen! Can I see your tickets?’

Brian looked up to see that the man to whom the disturbingly loud voice belonged was now standing next to them, hand reached out towards them to receive their tickets. Brian flashed him a smile and a bit of a nod as a silent way of greeting him (and, at the same time, to drop the hint that he had to be more quiet – not to say completely silent, preferably) as he shifted slightly and dug into the pocket of his coat. Wordlessly, Brian handed the small yellow papers over, praying the man would get the silent hint, while at the same time, it failed to surprise him that he didn’t.

‘Thank you, lad,’ the man said, snatching the papers out of Brian’s fingers, studying them intensely as if to look for signs of fraudulence. ‘And what have you done to this one, then, to get him all exhausted at half past seven?’ he asked equally loudly with a nod towards Roger.

‘Oh, just a busy day at work,’ Brian said with an endeared smile towards his boyfriend, who had fought his way through another long day of braille classes and work so bravely. Just looking at him made Brian beam with pride; he was so proud of his boyfriend and of how well he was managing lately, which was why the unpleasant surprise hit him even harder when the complete stranger felt the need to cast doubt on this for a reason as superficial as their outfits.

 _‘Really?’_ the conductor asked, loudly enough to make Roger stir in his sleep. Brian quickly started rubbing whose arm while following the eyes of the stranger as they trailed up and down their platform heels, their satin trousers, and Roger’s fur coat. ‘You aren’t dressed like it,’ he concluded, not even trying to hide the mockery in his voice. Brian could hardly oppress the tendency to roll his eyes and flash the man a just as patronising smile as the one he was currently receiving; he knew they didn’t exactly look like miners that toiled around in deep underground networks to search for their goals, but working with a whole team of music professionals on the task of integrating a newly blind person into a famous rock band, sometimes felt like just as much work. He would have loved to point all of this out to the complete stranger who was generalising their profession and dismissing the complexity of a situation the conductor knew absolutely nothing about, but eventually chose not to go into dept. He wasn’t going to let this random passer-by ruin his beautifully peaceful mood, and decided that he’d rather stand above people like this. Especially when he heard Roger humming out an unintelligible murmur as a result of the noise surrounding them, he realised that he’d better focus on the person who actually _deserved_ his undivided attention, than on the unwanted company standing before him.

‘We’re musicians, we don’t have to dress a certain way for studio work,’ Brian explained distantly while protectively pulling Roger against his body, hoping the man would understand that he wasn’t willing to have this conversation at the moment. But judging by the grin on the man’s face, he was just getting into it.

‘Ah, is that what you call sitting around and plucking at your guitar all day for a living nowadays? That’s what you call _‘working hard’_ these days?’ the conductor asked with a patronising smile, perforating the left upper corner of both tickets to mark them as not-reusable. Despite himself, Brian let out a bit of a snicker when he heard these words; it was almost _surreal_ how ignorant this guy was, how prejudiced against ‘today’s youth’ or ‘today’s musicians’ or as whatever he would classify them as, and he could no longer oppress the growing desire to use the man’s words against him. While continuing to rub Roger’s back in a fruitless attempt to keep him in his slumbering state of sleep, Brian spoke the sarcastic yet polite-sounding choice of words he had come up with during the unpleasant conversation. He convinced himself this might be the only way to show the intruder that he was being rude without coming across as rude himself; he didn’t want to lower himself to _that_ level, of course.

‘Oh no, it’s not so much that’s so hard for _most musicians_ ,’ Brian dismissed the assumption, hardly able to contain his self-satisfied smile when he continued. ‘It only becomes hard when you’ve recently fallen blind and you have to learn how to play without vision while trying to help your band finish an album before the deadline at the same time, like our drummer here does day in, day out,’ Brian managed just as casually and calmly as he had wished for. ‘So I suggest you go on with your terribly hard work and we let this one catch up some sleep after a long, busy day at work, shall we?’ he asked with a small smile, as if he had no idea just how badly he was using this man’s own words against him. ‘Can I have our tickets back, please?’ he asked innocently, deciding that the restrained, embarrassed, and most of all guilty look on the conductor’s face when he realised what he had just said towards a blind person trying to pick up his life again, was worth having to listen to the ignorant language of the man.

Brian, completely satisfied with his victory, thanked and greeted the employee exorbitantly for handing him back the tickets, just to make the man feel even worse about his interference. He stuffed the yellow papers into the pocket of his coat and focussed on Roger again, who was restlessly turning around by now. While using his free hand to pat his messy blond hair, Brian softly whispered soothing words at his boyfriend in the hope that he would be able to shush him back to sleep.

‘Shhhh… There’s nothing going on, baby. Just keep your eyes closed and go back to sleep,’ Brian whispered, rubbing slow, soothing patterns along Roger’s back.

‘Mmmh… Who was that?’ Roger groaned softly against the shoulder he was heavily leaning against. Luckily, he wasn’t making any effort to open his eyes or bring up his head, but judging by his coherence, he definitely wasn’t sleeping anymore, either, thanks to the conductor.

‘Just the conductor checking our tickets and wanting to make a bit of a chat. He’s probably just lonely at this point in time,’ Brian reassured him. Judging by when Roger had started to show the first signs of awakening, he had missed out on the conductor’s mocking remarks and his boyfriend’s reaction to them, which Brian gladly kept that way. There was no reason to bother Roger with such information; even though he would have loved to tell him how he had made the conductor shut up in no more than two sentences, hearing about the man’s presumptions about them would be nothing but a source of stress to drummer, who could be so terribly insecure when it came to other people’s impressions on him lately. Therefore, Brian simply stayed silent about the incident, keeping the joy of his unspoken victory and the good mood the weird situation had somehow given him, to himself.

This approach seemed to work; Roger moved on to a new topic without asking any more questions about the previous one. ‘What time is it?’

‘Half past seven,’ Brian replied, realising that the acquirement of this small piece of knowledge was a second positive side of the initially unwanted conversation. ‘We’ve still got more than an hour to go, dear. You might as well try and catch up some more sleep,’ he suggested, readjusting the collar of Roger’s coat like he would normally do with the duvets, to pull them tighter around his partner’s body. Unlike the previous man, Roger _did_ seem to understand the meaning of the small gestures Brian used to express himself with; he rested against Brian’s shoulder, letting the older man rub his back and nuzzle at his hair. Brian, satisfied with Roger’s reaction, quickly glanced around to check if no one was paying attention to them, and when he had confirmed that no one was looking their way or even able to glance at them from their seats, he carefully prodded his forefinger at Roger’s lips.

But even though Roger was very tired – in fact, tired enough to instantly give in to this little habit they had established months ago, something that would just give him this last bit of support he needed to drift off into sleep – he wasn’t willing to do it this time, knowing they were in public. He pursed his lips tightly and shook his head, but as Brian looked up to meet his eyes, he saw a questioning look in them, as if Roger asked him if it really was okay in the given situation.

‘It’s fine. The conductor is gone, there are no other people who can see us, and you know I don’t mind,’ Brian reassured him, which was a bit of an understatement; he secretly thought it was the cutest thing ever when Roger, in a state of drowsiness, bordering on falling asleep, would take the tip of his finger between his lips and just softly start sucking on it until he would eventually fall asleep.

‘Are you sure?’ Roger asked, habitually opening his eyes and moving his head up to see if there really was no one paying attention to him, in his state of sleepiness being the latter of them to realise that he couldn’t see this anyway. Before this dawned on him, Brian had already pulled him against his shoulder again, comforting him with his hand drawing patterns on his back.

‘I’m sure. Trust me, it’s safe,’ Brian whispered while running his index finger along Roger’s bottom lip, waiting for him to take the bait, which didn’t take long – it was just a matter of seconds that Roger needed to put his worries about someone seeing aside and parting his lips to take the tip of Brian’s finger inside his mouth. At first, he just kept it there against teeth, but he soon started sucking on it, and Brian could feel his body relaxing against his, ready to fall into unconsciousness again for what Brian hoped was going to be the rest of the journey. It was the irregularity with which he sucked on Brian’s digit, that made the guitarist aware that it wasn’t going to take long before he was going to drift off. And indeed, as expected, it didn’t take more than a few more strokes along his back and some quiet, wordless hums from Brian to bring Roger back to sleep again. Now that he couldn’t see his face, Brian couldn’t tell for sure when exactly he crossed the line between dozing off and actually sleeping, but the moment he stopped sucking on the finger between his slightly parted lips, seemed to be a pretty accurate indication for Brian to tell when this happened.

Brian smiled softly to himself and pressed a kiss against Roger’s hair the moment he was sure he was asleep again, flashing his lover a tender look. He could look at his sleeping boyfriend until the end of time, and he would have done so, if he hadn’t been so tired himself. He looked around in the nearly empty train compartment to consider the circumstances and whether they would enable or disable him to fall asleep, and he soon found that most of them worked in favour of his plan. The public room was quiet, the lights were dimmed, and though it was cold, Roger’s small body pressing against his gave him a sense of warmth and security no other source of heat could ever grant him. He therefore decided to give trying to fall asleep a go and relaxed into the not so comfortable chair, shifting as much as he deemed possible with a sleeping boyfriend leaning against him, until he decided he had found the right position.

When everything was fine – as fine as it could be, considering the place he was in – there was just one more thing for the guitarist to do, which was releasing his finger from its confinements. No matter how cute it was to have Roger suck on it while he was trying to fall asleep, Brian couldn’t help feeling a bit more relaxed while _not_ having to worry about Roger closing two rows of perfectly sharp teeth around his finger in his sleep. Brian carefully tried to remove the finger from Roger’s lips, but as soon as he pulled it back, Roger pursed his lips around it, humming out something inaudibly in his sleep. Brian stopped his motions, waited until he was sure Roger was still sleeping, and tried again; without any results, for a second time. The drummer this time turned around slightly in his sleep, and when he did both this and murmured something intelligible at the same time during Brian’s third attempt, he decided to give up.

‘Shhh…’ Brian habitually shushed and pushed his finger a little further between Roger’s lips again, smiling once more when the younger man unconsciously started sucking on it again. He decided to just let him be; he preferred taking the risk of waking up with bite marks on his index finger to having to disturb his precious boyfriend again. Resting his head against Roger’s, Brian closed his eyes, hoping for the best in terms of the survival of his finger and letting the continuous up- and down going movements of the train rock him to sleep.

 


	7. Slate and Stylus

‘Bri, look what Cynthia gave me at school today!’

Once Brian had picked up the coat Roger had just sloppily discarded on the countertop and decently put it on the coat hook next to the door, he turned around to find his lover diving deeply into the backpack on the kitchen table. Roger first pulled out a few alphabet cards and work sheets before he eventually fished out the item he had been looking for – that was, Brian _assumed_ that the object he was holding was what he had been searching, judging by the wide smile on Roger’s face. For a second, Brian was glad that Roger couldn’t see him, because he was afraid he could not flash him a bright smile back; not as long as he had absolutely _no_ idea what the thing Roger was holding was. He therefore stared at the unknown item in puzzlement, his brain spinning to come up with a solution to the question which purpose the tool could possibly serve.

The material and shape of it, a thin, rectangular piece of plastic, didn’t provide any useful  information, so Brian focussed on the remarkable aspects of the item instead. When he looked at it a little better, he saw that it consisted of two layers of aluminium pressed against each other, which didn’t seem to be flat and solid – there were rows of holes on one side, small gaps that turned the upper layer of aluminium into a grid. Unfortunately for Brian, this only turned the purpose of it into even more than a mystery than it had been before. What in the world would people enrolled in braille class need a weird-looking aluminium grid for?

‘Brian? Are you still here?’ Roger eventually asked when the silence in the kitchen lasted too long, and Brian rubbed over his own forehead while replying somewhat awkwardly.

‘Yes, baby, of course. I was just looking at this…’ _Damnit, what on **earth** could it be?_ ‘this tool. Great that they gave you one to use at home!’ Brian said as excitedly as possible, hoping his insecurity about the unknown thing wasn’t audible in his voice. Luckily for him, Roger didn’t seem to notice, because he happily continued talking about it.

‘Yes, they said that the only way to learn how to use a slate is to practice as much as possible,’ Roger said as he fluttered around the kitchen table, searching for the place where his chair was standing.

 _A slate! That explains something,_ Brian thought to himself, until he looked at it again and realised that it _did not, in fact, explain anything;_ it looked nothing like the kind of slate he knew, and on top of that, he had no idea how Roger was supposed to use the thing that apparently was a slate. He remembered that Roger had lately indeed been talking endlessly about using a slate in class to write braille, and Brian had always just smiled and nodded – and then remembered that he had to vocalise these pleasantries because Roger couldn’t _hear_ any of these – as if he had known exactly what he was talking about. In fact, though, he had no idea. Before Roger had brought up slate used for Braille, Brian hadn’t even known it was possible to not just read but also write in braille yourself. The embossed dots that represented letters did not seem to be easily reproducible by anything other than a special printing machine, but according to his partner’s stories, there seemed to be a way to do this manually. And apparently, the way to do this was through the rectangular piece of aluminium that started to look more odd the longer Brian looked at it.

‘… So they suggested I should take one home, so I could make some homework assignments with it,’ Roger rattled on, and Brian saw his chance to subtly yet effectively break through the annoying feeling of misunderstanding towards the tool.

‘Well, if you have to practice anyway, would you mind to give me a little demonstration?’ Brian asked, and Roger seemed all too glad to do so. He flopped down on his chair and pulled Brian’s back in a clumsy but sweet attempt to invite him to sit down next to him. The guitarist sat down next to Roger, who in the meantime emptied the contents of his bag – a book, alphabet sheets, homework sheets, a handful of white pieces of paper, a weird-looking needle with plastic handle – on the space before him on the kitchen table, next to what was supposed to be a slate. Brian watched while Roger rearranged the items; he put a piece of paper in front of him, the homework sheets above it, and the slate and needle, a new object of mystery to Brian, on the right side of it.

‘Alright, so this is the slate,’ Roger said as he picked up the rectangular tool. ‘There are little gaps all over it, and you can write one letter or symbol in each of them,’ he explained. ‘So what you do, you open the slate, and you put the paper between both sides…’ Roger said while he fiddled to place the paper inside the opened slate in such a way that the sheet fit exactly when he closed the aluminium slate around it with a soft _click_. Brian made a hum of agreement – he felt like he was starting to understand where this was going. By marking off where one had to punctuate the sheet of paper to create Braille symbols, the slate was starting to have a clear purpose in Brian’s eyes, but he still did not know where to go from that point. Luckily, Roger was all too eager to show him.

‘So now you take the stylus,’ Roger said and picked up the thing that Brian before had been thinking of as a needle. ‘You use this to punctuate the paper. You press it against the paper so it makes a little dot on the opposite side of the paper. So let’s say, I want to write… I’ll just write my own name, because that’s the only thing I know by heart,’ Roger snickered softly and pressed the stylus against various places on the paper. ‘This way you can write letters, words, sentences… And when you’re done,’ Roger excitedly continued, ‘you just open the slate, flip over the page, and you can read what you’ve written with your fingers,’ Roger said while simultaneously carrying out the actions he was describing. He took the paper out of the slate, turned it over, and slowly spoke his own name while his finger trailed along the dots he had just created.

‘Very smart,’ Brian said pensively, and he seriously meant it – it was just that there were a few more questions on his mind that prevented him from being as excited about the concept of writing in Braille as Roger was. ‘But how can you read it? You just turned over the page, isn’t everything backwards now?’ he pondered out loud.

‘Very observant,’ Roger smiled. ‘That’s why you write everything backwards.’

‘Backwards?’ Brian asked. ‘I thought Braille was hard enough already!’ he muttered despondently, as if his last hope of ever fully understanding the alphabet Roger seemed to have no difficulty with, had vanished like snow in sunlight. In all those months Roger had been having classes and had learned to read – and even write – braille amazingly well, while Brian still struggled to recognise each one of the characters even with the help of braille cards. Hearing that writing braille required the skill of being able to write backwards, was not exactly an encouraging thought to the guitarist.

‘It’s not that hard,’ Roger soothed. ‘I have an alphabet sheet for it somewhere here.’ He leant over and picked up the cards he had placed above his sheet of paper. ‘One of these is the normal alphabet card, and the other one is backwards,’ he said and handed the sheets over to Brian, who placed them next to each other to compare them and found that all the signs indeed had been mirrored. Now that he thought about it, it indeed made sense that one had to write backwards in order to later read the signs, but that did not mean Brian thought he was going to be good at this. He knew he didn’t have to, but still; he wanted to help Roger with his assignments, let Roger know he wanted to be involved with the things he did, let him know he was not alone in this… And, last but not least, Brian hated that lingering feeling of not completely understanding something the people around him seemed to get, so he asked Roger for some more explanation.

‘Can you show me some more?’ Brian asked, and Roger nodded.

‘I’ll just start with the first exercise,’ Roger answered, his fingertips running along multiple sheets of assignments before finding the one Brian assumed was the one he needed. He put the paper above of his slate and slowly read the assignment at the top of the paper. Brian patiently waited for Roger to understand what he had to do, and he was soon informed that he had to copy – in mirrored writing, that was – the list of words on the assignment page. With the stylus in his right hand and his left hand on the alphabet sheet Brian had handed back to him, he started working on the recreation of simple words, most of which did not contain more than four or five letters. Brian had moved closer to him and was watching his boyfriend’s movements intently; the way he gently created small cavities into the paper with the stylus in his slightly unsteady right hand, the way his forefinger occasionally shifted across the alphabet page to make sure he was using the right combination of dots, until he eventually deemed this double check unnecessary; how he frowned lightly with every new word, a small furrow between his eyebrows that vanished and made place for a smile whenever he had figured out how to go about writing down the word. While Roger worked hard on his homework, all Brian could think about was how precious his boyfriend was in his concentrated state of being, and how proud he was of Roger for adjusting to his new life as being visually impaired so uncomplainingly and so bravely.

When he had finished the first exercise, Roger (and Brian, too) was eager to see how he had done, so he opened the slate and pulled out the paper. Roger read his own answers out aloud and found that he had only made a few minor mistakes – confused the R and the W, two combinations that mirrored each other – among the list that covered the whole page, which Brian found to be a perfect result.

‘Very well done, little genius,’ he said and pecked his unexpecting partner’s cheek, causing Roger to blush slightly. ‘Really, you’re great at this! I couldn’t do what you can, even if I had practiced for ages. What’s the next exercise?’

‘Some simple sentences, I think. Things like ‘the car is blue,’ ‘I am going home,’ ‘the weather is nice…’ Roger said, his voice trailing down as he looked for the required sheet. He flicked through the small pile, until his hands suddenly stopped moving and he cast a glance into Brian’s direction. ‘But I think I know something more interesting than that. You can try to write something, and then I’ll read it and write a response to it. Do you want to do that?’ Roger asked excitedly.

‘Uh, well…’ Brian let his eyes travel along the daunting sight of slates, papers, and assignment sheets, all of which he had no idea how to work with. Above of that, the concept of writing backwards still felt utterly new and rather impossible to him, and he had no idea if it was something he could do.

‘Come on, it’ll be fun!’ Roger encouraged him, and after one look at the hopeful expression on his face, it wasn’t hard for Brian to make a decision.

‘Okay then. As long as I get to use the translation sheets,’ he agreed, and Roger flashed him one of those shy yet wide smiles Brian would occasionally get if Roger was excited about having persuaded someone to do something they were not so sure about in the first place. The drummer fixed a clean sheet between the slate, shoved this – together with the required alphabet pages – in Brian’s direction, and pushed the stylus against Brian’s lower arm in an attempt to hand it over to him.

Brian took the stylus from Roger’s fingers and stared at the slate before him. Even though he had just seen Roger use it for twenty minutes, he still felt like he was completely new to the device -  unfamiliar and unexperienced. He had no idea what to write, how to mark the beginning or the end of a sentence in braille, or how hard he had to push the stylus against the paper to create a tangible dot without piercing the paper. He even didn’t know how to properly hold the stylus, that lay heavy and uncomfortable in his hand; all of which while Roger hopefully looked at him and waited until he heard a sound of motion coming from Brian’s side, which would indicate that he had started writing.

‘Alright then,’ Brian eventually said once he had determined what he was going to write; a simple, three-word eight-letter sentence he figured he should be able to write and Roger should be able to understand even if he happened to make a mistake. With the help of two cards – one that translated the normal Latin alphabet into braille combinations, and a card that mirrored the braille signs for writing purposes. It took him a while, and Brian was afraid that the dots were hardly tangible because his hand was not as steady as Roger’s was, but he eventually delivered something he deemed decent enough to hand over to his boyfriend, who was eagerly waiting to find what he had written to him.

Roger moved his finger along the dots to speak the braille combinations out loud, letter for letter. ‘Well, it starts with a J,’ he declared, and Brian immediately felt his smile drop, given that his sentence was not supposed to begin with that letter.

‘I don’t know what I did, but it’s meant to be an I,’ Brian informed Roger a bit awkwardly.

‘Oh, that’s okay, the I and J are very similar,’ Roger comforted him, before moving on. ‘So we have I, space, L, O...’

Just when Brian felt it was going the right way, Roger stopped speaking and frowned lightly, bending a little closer to the page as if that would help him understand the symbol better. ‘This is… I’ve had this before, I know it exists, but I can’t exactly pinpoint it,’ he said and reached for the alphabet card, immediately moving on to the additional symbol chart below it.

‘So whatever I’ve done, it’s not a letter?’ Brian asked with an awkward giggle.

‘I would’ve recognised it by now if it was a letter,’ Roger answered. After a bit of feeling around, he concluded that it had to be a hashtag, and Brian blushed when Roger snickered about his clumsy attempt to write something. Especially when it turned out that the following combination did not stand for a letter, but a numeral instead – a five, to be precise – Roger was unable to stop giggling.

‘This is one of the most interesting words I’ve read in a while, L-O-#-5,’ Roger spelled out loud with an ongoing smile on his lips. ‘I’m curious to find what more you’ve written.’

‘So am I,’ Brian snickered. He had known right away that he wasn’t going to be good at this whole braille writing process, but to discover that the only good thing about it the last word was that he had not written any more symbols or numerals, was somewhat disappointing and embarrassing.

‘Well,’ Roger laughed when he had put everything together. ‘J L-O-#-5 Q-O-Z. I have a feeling that that is… Not exactly what you meant.’

‘ _’Not exactly what you meant’_ is the understatement of the year. It was supposed to say _I love you,_ ’ Brian told Roger, to which the drummer burst out in hysterical laughter, covering his face with his hands and not making the slightest attempt to hold back his amusement for, let’s say, the sake of dignity and perhaps Brian’s self-confidence.

‘Why, you don’t have to laugh at me!’ Brian said quasi-indignantly, but he knew he didn’t leave much of an impression on his boyfriend when he couldn’t hold back a chuckle as well, because let’s be honest – his ability to mess up five out of eight letters in an easy sentence, was truly amusing.

‘Sorry, that’s really sweet, but you… it’s a complete chaos,’ Roger said when he had gotten control over his voice again, wiping tears of laughter from his face. ‘I don’t know _what_ you did. You added a dot to the ‘I’ so now it’s a J, and you didn’t mirror the code for v, so it ended up being a hashtag. And I just literally can’t think of what you did to the rest of the codes, it’s really that bad,’ he said, immediately starting to laugh at Brian’s clumsiness again.

‘Don’t make fun at me, will you! I tried my best,’ Brian pouted.

‘I know, babe, and I appreciate that. Wait, let me write something for you,’ Roger said, so Brian gave him the slate, stylus and paper again, waiting while Roger wrote a response to him. ‘Here you are,’ Roger said when he handed everything back to the guitarist, who, with more than just a little help from the translation sheets, managed to decode Roger’s message to him.

‘You… you are, you are not… you are not good at this?’ Brian slowly read, receiving a forceful nod.

‘Well, at least you can _read_ in Braille, that’s something!’ Roger cooed.

‘Why, thank you! I poured my _heart_ and _soul_ into this!’ Brian cried out, knowing that Roger could judge by the chuckle in his voice that he wasn’t seriously mad at him. ‘I told you I loved you, I was hoping you were going to write something romantic to me as well…’

‘Oh, I can do that, if you want. Give me a second,’ Roger proposed, his fingers working to punctuate a new message right below the previous one. It took him a bit longer to write this time, given that the sentence was long enough to need two lines on the paper to be fully written out.

The paper was given back to Brian again, who quickly concluded that Roger’s message started off with the correct version of what he had been trying to tell him before. ‘ _I love you_ … Ahw, that’s cute, baby,’ Brian said, but he frowned lightly when he found that these three words were succeeded by _almost, almost as much as…_

 _‘I love you almost as much as chocolate?’_ Brian read out loud, rolling his eyes when he once again received a nod from his partner. ‘Something romantic, I said!’

‘It _is_ romantic! It says _I love you_ , doesn’t it?’ Roger reminded him.

‘Yes, but not exactly the way I hoped,’ Brian sighed.

‘Oh no, wait, I know what you were looking for,’ Roger suddenly said, pulling the paper back to his side of the table again. He started punctuating the paper in full concentration, but soon his stifled giggles made it clear to Brian that he was up to something. The drummer was hardly able to oppress his amusement by the time he shoved the paper back to his partner again.

‘Alright, let’s see,’ Brian started. ‘ This is J, then a space…’ Brian paused for a second to let the realisation of what this might be in in. ‘Roger Meddows Taylor, if you just recreated whatever I wrote to you, I swear to all that is holy-’ Brian threatened, and when Roger doubled over in laughter, he knew that there was no need to read any further. One quick comparison between his own sentence, the previous message Roger had written, and the one he was decoding right now, was enough for Brian to know that Roger had given him a ‘revised’ version of _I love you more than chocolate._

‘You are undoubtedly the absolute _worst_ ,’ Brian grumbled quasi-indignantly.

‘Can you write that in braille, please?’ Roger dared him, still recovering from his fit of laughter, and Brian couldn’t help joining him.

‘You unbelievable tease,’ Brian chuckled, grating his knuckles over Roger’s messy hair. ‘No, I probably couldn’t write that in braille in a hundred years. I’m just hoping I might be able to properly write _I love you,_ without any hashtags or numerals, by the end of the day. That’s all I need to be able to write to you anyway,’ Brian said, kissing the top of Roger’s head. He could see that Roger blushed slightly, before the drummer leant over to reciprocate the kiss, against Brian’s cheek this time.

‘I love you too. Even more than chocolate, now that I’m thinking about it,’ Roger added in a giggle, receiving another kiss from Brian.

‘Well, if my ability to write braille develops at the same speed as your ability to say something romantic does, I’m sure we’ll get there eventually,’ Brian remarked, after which they both focussed on the long-forgotten assignment in front of them again.


	8. The Christmas Tree

Brian had secretly been hoping that Roger, no longer able to see the street being dolled up for Christmas weeks in advance of the actual event, would not start begging to decorate their house at the first day of December anymore. Unfortunately, the opposite was true; hearing a few stray Christmas songs on the radio was all it had taken to get Roger in the mood for the party. This was why Brian, after having succumbed to the endless asking and begging of his boyfriend, found himself standing at the market and unexcitedly looking around the section of Christmas trees of a flower salesman who had switched his assortment from roses and daisies to pine trees for the occasion.

‘I want a large tree, bigger than the one we had last year,’ Roger declared while he tugged at Brian’s hand to make him move forward faster. It still surprised Brian that Roger would often take the lead when they were walking hand in hand somewhere; it seemed more logical to the guitarist that he, being able to see their surroundings, would show Roger the way instead of the other way around. Then again, maybe it should not surprise him as much as it did; he was familiar with Roger’s impatience and how it only grew worse in situations that excited him, like the current one – shopping for a Christmas tree – was doing.

‘I was more thinking about a tree that fits into the car, to be honest,’ Brian answered while he peered questioningly at the trees they passed. Most of them were much taller and wider than what he was looking for; some made him doubt if they even fit through the front door of the average London residence. Sure, Roger was going to love him for buying one of these excessive trees, but given that they had to take the tree home, preferably by car and not with a truck or anything the like, and fit it into the living room without damaging the doorpost (either on accident or by forcibly removing the wooden frame to fit the tree through it), it seemed better to Brian to go for a normal sized tree.

‘That’s just a minor detail,’ Roger smiled, holding out the hand that was not constricted by Brian’s, who irremovably clung to him in an attempt to hold onto Roger in the maze of pine trees and a handful of fellow Christmas shoppers. Roger felt around to find the trees, an excited smile forming on  his face when he felt his hand connecting with the flexible branches he had been searching for.

‘How about this one?’ Roger asked, shaking his hand apart from Brian’s to explore the shape and firmness of the fir he had elected. He deemed both these factors to be alright, and continued to stretch on his tiptoes to find how tall the tree was. He then unfortunately found that he could easily reach the single top branch, meaning that the tree was not tall enough, so he somewhat clumsily moved over to the section next to it. Brian, on the other hand, lingered at the tree Roger had just discarded as an option. It was maybe five foot tall, did not have too many protruding branches, and its needles looked shiny and healthy. Just as Brian look a step closer to inspect the paper price tag that had been attached to the top branch with a thin piece of rope, his partner diverted his attention from this year’s potential Christmas tree to the one he had discovered.

‘This one feels fine to me,’ Roger said, and when Brian turned to look at the man standing a few metres away from him, he saw Roger reaching out a bare hand to touch the fir needles. Brian strode over to him, knowing by experience that they were soft, yet surprisingly sharp when approached from the right – or actually, the wrong – direction.

‘Roger, put your gloves back on!’ Brian ordered, knowing that if he allowed his boyfriend to touch the tree with bare fingers, he would undoubtedly manage to end up with one of those organic needles lodging in the skin of his hands in no time. Roger muttered an inaudible complaint as he let his fingers slip back into the gloves he had just taken off, only to squeeze a branch of the tree afterwards, as if it was his aim to do everything within his power to worry Brian.

‘I like this tree, Bri,’ the drummer informed his boyfriend, who looked sceptically at the tree that towered above the two of them. It was without a doubt going to fit in the car, let alone in their room.

‘That might be, but I don’t think this will even fit in our living room. It’s way too big,’ Brian said.

‘You know I like all things big,’ Roger threw back at an unexpecting Brian, who sighed audibly as a form of silent protest to the inappropriate comment. He did not know if he should be happy that the salesman was walking towards them; the man would probably manage to swing the conversation back to a decent topic again, but Brian was not exactly in the mood to be talked into buying an expensive  Christmas tree – and, with that, giving in to his boyfriend’s demands.

‘Good afternoon, folks. Have you seen – or felt – anything you like yet?’ The salesman that Brian estimated was about their age appeared next to them, making some obvious eye contact with the huge tree he had probably seen Roger hanging around. Even though Roger could not see this, it did not surprise Brian that the drummer was quick to seize his opportunity of getting the large tree.

‘Well, I’m thinking that this tree right here could work-’

‘Something of average size, please,’ Brian took over in a louder voice, flashing the somewhat confused looking salesman a small smile to gloss over the interruption of his lover. Luckily for Brian, the salesman seemed to understand that he was in charge and he led the two of them to the section with trees about the size of those Brian had seen before. Roger did not agree with it and had soon found trees that were easily a foot taller and wider than Brian had in mind, but it was unfortunately two against one; Roger didn’t seem to be willing to settle with anything less than a six feet tall fir tree, and the salesman of course did everything he could to talk Brian into buying a taller – read: more expensive – Christmas tree. After some size calculations, the reminder the displayed trees were just for the show and that the purchased specimens came in nettings for easier and more compact transport, and the promise that the man – who in the meantime had discovered that Roger was visually impaired – was going to help him bring the tree to the car, Brian eventually gave in.

Roger, naturally, was delighted when Brian finally let him have his way. He made this obvious to his lover by stretching on his tiptoes and giving him a clumsy yet enthusiastic kiss on his cheek while Brian reached for the crumpled bills in the pocket of his coat, before he moved over to the newly purchased tree again.

‘Are we going to decorate it first thing when we get home?’ Roger asked, and Brian turned away from the salesman to glance at him instead. One look at him was enough to remind Brian of why he had given in to Roger’s wishes against better judgement; just the sight of him, his fair skin, his cheeks flustered from the cold weather, the blond hair peaking from underneath the grey wool bonnet, was all anyone needed to change their mind and simply give Roger what he was asking for.

‘Of course, babe,’ Brian answered him. Then, with a bit of a smile and a hand containing the sum of money they had just agreed on, towards the man to wordlessly excuse himself for having interrupted their conversation about the origins of the Christmas tree, he sighed: ‘The things we do for love.’

The salesman accepted the money, but after having thanked him for handing it to him, he remarked: ‘You don’t seem too excited about Christmas altogether, lad.’

‘I will get excited about it, the day before or so. Three weeks in advance I’m just not in the mood yet,’ Brian reassured him.

‘Hold on, I think I have something for you,’ Brian’s interlocutor said and walked off to a cluster of boxes standing next to the section of netted fir trees they were soon going to pick one from. He crouched down and fumbled with the plant-like contents of one of the plastic boxes, soon returning with a dark green bundle of leaves and thin branches, knotted together with a red ribbon. ‘Here you go. Maybe a few kisses from your sweetheart will help you get in the mood,’ the salesman winked with a glance at Roger, who, unaware of the topic of their conversation, was examining firs again.

‘His kisses always help for everything,’ Brian smiled, remembering how much Roger had always liked both the look of- and the symbolic meaning behind the mistletoe, and how it had so far never failed its purpose of allowing for spontaneous, random kisses from Roger during the coldest month of the year. ‘How much is it?’

‘You can have it for free. Just promise that you’ll make use of it right away, and not wait until the day before Christmas, because I don’t think your boyfriend can wait for your Christmas mood to develop any longer,’ the salesman managed right before being overpowered by Roger trying to attract Brian’s attention so they could pick a tree and take it home.

‘I promise,’ Brian smiled as he was handed the perfect little bundle of mistletoe branches. He didn’t get much time to appreciate the sight of it, unfortunately, for Roger’s voice calling out to him soon asked for his attention. He thanked the salesman for his generosity and walked towards his boyfriend, his minded obscured by the question how and when he was going to surprise Roger with the gift.

# # #

Brian was glad when he could flop down on the sofa when they finally arrived home. He had heaved the tree, which Roger had trusted him to pick since he couldn’t see what the ones they could choose from looked like, out of the car, dragged it into the living room, cut the rope netting that compacted it away, and placed it in the corner of the room. He collected a box of Christmas decorations from under their bed, hid the mistletoe in the hallway until the right moment to present it to Roger would occur, and retreated to the sofa, letting Roger amuse himself with the task of dolling up the temporary acquisition to their interior.

But just the fact that Brian was finally sitting in the living room with the newspaper in his hands, did not mean that he was getting any rest. Just when he was about to make himself comfortable on the sofa again, he saw Roger fiddling around with the string of lights, and deciding that it was not a good idea to let the blind drummer toy with electricity, he got up to complete the task himself. After this, Roger almost made the Christmas tree fall over in his desperate attempts to cover its branches with silvery garlands, so Brian again walked over to relieve himself from the potential chaos a falling fir tree would leave behind in their living room. When all of this had been said and done, the guitarist assumed that he could finally have a moment of rest, but he could not have been more wrong; Roger fired questions at him as if his life depended on it. He wanted to know if the tree looked good, whether the lights had been distributed evenly over the surface of the branches, which colour the bauble he was holding in hands was, and so on, leaving Brian no single second of rest.

‘Bri, what colour is this bauble?’ Roger asked, forcing Brian to look up from his newspaper and glance over at his counterpart. Roger was sitting cross-legged on the floor in between a pile of baubles, stars, and other Christmas ornaments he was considering putting in their tree. It was certainly not the first time he was asking for Brian’s use of eyesight; every time he picked up a new ornament, he asked for his partner’s judgement on its colour, shape, and most desirable place in the tree.

‘It’s red, babe,’ Brian answered him while flipping the page of the newspaper, a quiet hint that he was engaged with something else, but he could have known that this was not going to stop Roger from asking for extended information.

‘What kind of red? Dark or light?’ Roger asked, studying the bauble at close quarters, as if this would make a significant difference to him in terms of determining its colour.

‘It’s dark red.’

‘Is it shiny?’ Roger continued.

‘Yes, it’s shiny,’ Brian said without looking up from the headline he was reading, not exactly sure about his answer but knowing there was no way Roger could find out that he was just taking a guess.

‘If I put it here, would it look good with the surrounding colours?’ Roger asked pensively, and Brian could hardly oppress his smile. It was unbelievable how someone who could absolutely see nothing at all, could worry about something as trivial as whether the colours of their Christmas tree decorations went together well or not. It was so typically Roger to worry his pretty little head about such useless matter, and though Brian was not exactly in the mood to continuously answer his endless stream of questions, he couldn’t help finding it adorable at the same time to see his partner being so enthusiastically occupied with this matter.

Giving up on his attempt to inform himself of the daily news, Brian guitarist put his newspaper aside to focus on his boyfriend and whose occupations instead. ‘Yes, that would look good,’ Brian agreed, watching as Roger fiddled to try and pull the chord of the bauble over one of the randomly selected fir branch, which brought along another question.

‘Does the tree _really_ look good?’ Roger asked for what must have been at least the fifth time as he put the Christmas ball down on the floor and instead sceptically plucked at a branch, and Brian assured him that it did.

‘It looks just fine, babe.’

‘It feels a little… wide. Is it not too broad or anything?’ Roger frowned, trying to measure the width of the tree with both his hands.

‘It doesn’t look too broad,’ Brian said, but he couldn’t just leave it at that – he could understand that Roger, who had always liked Christmas, continued to enjoy dolling up their tree just for the excitement of it. He was, however, curious to find out why Roger was even pickier about the physique of their tree than he had been while he had been able to see it. ‘Darling, why are you so concerned with what our tree looks like if you can’t even see it?’ he asked.

‘That’s exactly why! You picked it, and I can’t see if it’s a somewhat decent tree. Maybe you picked one that looks weird!’ the drummer argued.

‘Why would you worry about me picking a weird-looking tree?’ Brian asked with a chuckle, something that soon faded when Roger gave him an unexpectedly impudent reply.

‘From what I can remember, one look at your wardrobe should be enough to validate my concerns,’ Roger said with an insecure yet cheeky smile tugging at the corners of his lips, fully aware of how badly he was teasing his boyfriend and his taste in fashion again.

‘Roger, how dare you!’ Brian said. ‘I’ll bring this tree right back to the market if you start insulting my _indisputably_ tasteful wardrobe,’ he warned his boyfriend, but he was unable to cut back a snicker – he knew very well what Roger thought about his style in fashion, and him no longer being able to personally experience the sight of it did not prevent him from continuing to comment on it.

‘As if they would take back a tree from a hobo. They’ll probably accuse you of digging it out of the woods and returning it for the refund,’ Roger giggled, clearly satisfied with his comeback.

Brian at first attempted to say snap back just as wittily, but as he could not come up with anything that would beat Roger’s words, he indirectly gave in to his loss with an only slightly accusatorily, ‘Oh, what are we being clever today.’ Brian got up and crouched down on the floor next to Roger, giving whose cheek something of a squeeze and deciding to just play along with Roger’s joke. ‘So, have you yet decided where you’re going to put this bauble, or does the hobo get to decide?’

‘Since I can’t see a thing, I’m giving this one to you and I’ll pray that your taste in Christmas decoration is better than that in fashion,’ Roger said as he pressed the bauble against Brian’s wrist; the guitarist quickly took it over before it would fall to pieces on the floor beneath them.

‘Why, and given that my fashion sense is _outstanding_ , my Christmas decorating skills must be something no single mortal has ever experienced before,’ Brian said in full conviction while strung he cord of the bauble to a branch, Roger’s contagious giggle making him smile, as it never failed to do. It truly was a heart-warming thing to see and hear Roger enjoying himself with something as simple as decorating a tree. Just watching him calculate, measure, and plan where to put each single star, each single Christmas angel, each single bauble, and whatever more the box contained, seemed rather tiresome to Brian. But, judging by the concentrated look on Roger’s face that was occasionally broken with a small smile whenever he was satisfied with his creations, the drummer was amusing himself perfectly, which was all that mattered to Brian. Even though he could hardly focus on anything himself – that was, the question when to bring out the mistletoe – for more than five seconds before Roger would direct the attention back to whatever he was doing, Brian loved spending time with Roger and watching his work in progress nevertheless. Slowly but steadily, they worked their way through all available Christmas ornaments, something Roger only discovered the moment he reached over to grab a new item, just to find that there was nothing left to pick up.

‘I believe the box is empty,’ Roger said as he skimmed his hands along the carton surface of the box. When his fingers did not touch anything, he held the box upside down to check his assumption.

‘Yes, and if it hadn’t been, it had been by now,’ Brian commented with a chuckle, dimly thinking that now, right after the decoration session, might be the right moment to bring out the surprise he still had in mind for Roger. He stood up from his position on the floor as soundlessly as possible, but for Roger, who was trained to rely on his hearing rather than any other sense, this did not go unnoticed.

‘Where are you going?’ Roger asked when he heard his partner getting up, slightly disappointed by Brian’s unexpected departure; this emotion was backed up by the sight of two sad, blue eyes that never failed to break Brian’s heart.

‘I just remembered that I forgot something that might be nice as decoration,’ Brian answered, ruffling Roger’s blond hair when he was standing up straight again. A pensive expression formed on Roger’s face, until he soon after came up with a possible explanation to Brian’s vague hint.

‘The tree-topper?’ he guessed.

‘I’ll be right back,’ Brian promised him instead of answering the question, opening the door to the hallway and stepping inside. He carefully picked up the small bundle of mistletoe twigs he had put down on the drawer earlier that afternoon, rearranging the branches with his fingertips. He wondered if Roger was going to recognise the symbolic item; he surely had been enthusiastic about it since the very moment Freddie had first introduced the mistletoe at a Christmas party years ago, and had always insisted on repeating the tradition ever since. But this was the first time he was not going to see the adorable little bundle of twigs and its cute, red ribbon; he could only judge by its shape and texture what it was, and Brian hoped he was going to recognise it.

Brian returned with the mistletoe in his hands and a feeling of both curiosity and uncertainty in his mind. The sound of the door closing behind him was all Roger needed to know that he was back, which was obviously surprising him. ‘Back already? I thought the Christmas' decoration was upstairs,’ Roger remarked. ‘Most of it is,’ Brian agreed when he sat down on the floor next to his partner again, ‘but this is not something to hide under the bed all year.’ ‘So it's not the tree-topper?’ Roger guessed. ‘You can use it as a tree-topper. Or in front of the window, or above the door, or wherever you want it. I'm leaving that to you, as long as you make sure to use it for its purpose,' Brian said, before he decided it was better to the gift to Roger before he would reveal the surprise by the many hints he knew he was prone to drop if he would be given the chance. Luckily, Roger was not allowing this to happen: with the palms of his hands turned open to receive the present and a matching, ‘you're making me very curious’ to announce that he was ready to find out, he welcomed the mistletoe Brian put in his hands. Brian nervously awaited Roger's response to the item while he watched Roger's lean fingers feeling at the branches, and he was more than relieved when Roger's sudden smile told him he knew what he had just been given. ‘This most certainly shouldn't be kept under the bed,’ Roger acknowledged. ‘I know a much better place for this,’ he said, a tinge of excitement visible on his face and audible in his voice, both of which Brian loved to notice. This time it was Roger’s turn to get up from the floor; he stood up and walked towards the door to the kitchen, where he knew was a small hook above the doorpost that they had used to strung up previous mistletoes the years before. He stretched out on his tiptoes in his quest for the nail; he smoothed his fingertips over the surface of the wall, until his forefinger bumped into the hook. He fiddled for the small loop in the red ribbon, which he used to hang the mistletoe up on the therefore designed location. Roger then took a step back as if to study the result, but soon lapsed into his habit of asking for Brian's opinion on the matter instead, since he could not judge for himself.

‘Does it look good like this?’ he asked pensively.

‘It looks somewhat messy. I’ll fix it for you,’ Brian quickly added when he feared that Roger would try to solve (read: worsen) the small imperfections himself. The guitarist walked over to the door, where he, standing right next to Roger, rearranged the branches and the ribbon that tied them together. ‘This is better,’ he decided when he had fulfilled his task.

‘I still remember how lovely it used to look, the mistletoe above the door to the kitchen…’ Roger said dreamily, but there was no touch of melancholia or heaviness in it, which Brian sometimes detected when Roger told him about things he remembered from the visually able years of his life. Recalling the image of the mistletoe seemed like a happy memory to him, not a brutal reminder of something he was never going to visually experience again. Still, Brian felt the need to comfort Roger by intertwining his fingers with his, and, naturally, by ensuring him this part of their Christmas attire looked just as beautiful as the rest of it did.

‘I can assure you, the mistletoe looks just as lovely as ever,’ Brian promised. ‘And if I’m not mistaken, it also works just as well as it used to do…’ he added smoothly. Roger looked up at him, and his adorably cheeky smile was all Brian needed to see to know that he was totally fine with what he was indirectly suggesting – and if it hadn’t been for his smile, his act of throwing both arms around Brian’s shoulders and bringing his face closer to his would have sufficed.

‘I think I owe you an answer to that after all the questions you answered for me today,’ Roger giggled, stretching on his tiptoes once again to express his love and gratitude for Brian in the first-ever kiss under a for him invisible mistletoe.


	9. Pillow Fight

Brian had found out long before Roger had gotten blind that his boyfriend could be like one’s car keys; they were never to be found at the place where one thought one had seen them the last time around.

This was why one evening, Brian found himself repeatedly calling Roger’s name at the foot of the stairs, a little worried to find that he did not get a reply, even though he knew Roger had nowhere else to be than at the second floor. After having looked through all of the first floor and the garden, Brian knew that Roger couldn’t be anywhere else than upstairs. The front door was locked, the windows were closed, the garden was fenced all around, so there was no possible other place apart from their bedroom or the bathroom where Roger could be at the moment; especially the first mentioned place was a room he was likely to be found, given that he often moved to their bedroom when he wanted to have some private time. Right now was also a likely moment for Roger to retreat to their room, where an old mahogany desk in the corner made a perfectly quiet place for him to study the braille work sheets he had received in class a few days ago, but which he had not managed to find the time for during their last few busy days. They therefore had to be done that night, as the next course would be the morning after. Roger not making his homework right no time was not something that happened very often – contrary to popular belief, Roger was always very focussed on his homework and didn’t let anyone interrupt while he was in the middle of reading or writing a sentence – a perfectly valid reason for Roger not to react to Brian’s calls. And, last but not least, one should not forget the fact that Roger, blind or not, remained a little rebel that did not always feel like obeying Brian’s orders and answering Brian’s calls.

Altogether, there were reasons enough for Brian not to worry about him, and yet, he didn’t feel entirely comfortable not knowing where exactly his boyfriend was. Despite and all the aforementioned logical assumptions as to why Roger didn’t reply, Brian still felt the desire to go check on him. Just to make sure he was alright, even though there was no direct reason to assume that there was something wrong – apart from the everlasting uneasy foreboding that Roger, being blind and left unsupervised, could easily get himself into potentially dangerous situations. Even though he had gotten used to walking around the house being blind and therefore hardly injured himself on a protruding piece of furniture or a momentarily forgotten threshold anymore, the chance of Roger hurting himself was a lot bigger than the chance of a visually able person doing so.

When Brian again did not receive a reply to his attempt to address Roger, his worry and protectiveness eventually got the better of him, so he treaded upstairs and stopped in front of their bedroom, lightly knocking on the door.

‘Babe, are you here? Are you making homework?’ Brian asked, but as expected, no reply followed. Brian repeated the question, but when he was given no response again, he decided to give himself permission to enter the room after the announcement that he was going to do so.

Brian softly opened the door to their bedroom, and his eyes had to adjust to the darkness that welcomed him for the first few seconds. Although he had gotten used to most of Roger’s tendencies and habits by now, walking in on him sitting in a dark room was something Brian simply didn’t seem to be able to get used to. He knew it didn’t make a difference to Roger whether or not the lights were on or off, but it just didn’t feel right to Brian to have his precious boyfriend sitting in blinding darkness. Therefore, the first thing he did when he stepped inside the room, was fumbling for the light switch behind the door to illuminate the bedroom, to make the room appear a bit more comfortable and so that at least _he_ could see what was going on inside of it.

Brian’s first instinct was to look for Roger at the desk against the wall right next to the door, but against his expectations, the bureau chair was empty. The desktop was covered with extra-large sized books and sheets of homework assignments in the only script Roger was able to understand at the moment, but the owner of the material was not to be found sitting in front of it, closely bent towards the pages like he usually did when focussing on his homework.

The guitarist frowned slightly and let his eyes slide through the room, but at the exact moment he caught a glimpse of his boyfriend, his sight was blurred by something flowing through the air. It was something rectangular, something big – something he managed to duck away from just enough to avoid it connecting to his face. It bumped against his shoulder instead, but it did not hurt at all; it was soft, light, and easily changed in shape. It fell to the floor with a dull thud, and Brian hardly had to look at it to make out what it was, for Roger’s excited shout was all he needed to understand.

‘Pillow fight!’ Roger exclaimed while throwing a second pillow in the direction of the door. Brian managed to avoid it completely this time, but he was amazed by how well-coordinated his partner was able to throw his weapons at him. Without any eye sight, he purely relied on sound; the sound of the door opening, the light being switched on, not a single footstep following from there, all of which for Roger probably translated to the idea that Brian was still standing in the door opening and that this was the place where he had to throw.

What also surprised Brian, now that he took a second to look at Roger in his cross-legged position in the middle of the bed was the amount of pillows Roger had gathered. He was surrounded by the four pillows from their own bed, the same amount from the guest room, the pillows from the chair in the corner, and a few that Brian did not even recognise in the heat of the moment. He hadn’t seen them for ages, but he remembered having stuffed away a few old cushions into closet in the guest room when they had moved into the house some years ago. It seemed like Roger remembered this, too, given that it was more or less impossible to stumble upon the pillows by accident if you could not see what you were doing, like Roger did. Instead, it seemed like Roger had known exactly where to look and how to go about firing pillows at Brian the moment he had walked through the door.

A pillow against his chest was what brought Brian back to the present; he quickly reached over to the floor and picked up the first and the best pillow he could lay his hands on. He tossed it back to the person who had thrown it at him and the first place – careful to make sure he wouldn’t hurt or startle Roger, yet precisely enough to let it come down on Roger’s hands when the drummer was about to pick up a new pillow. Roger emitted a small cry of both shock and excitement, but he was quick to recover from this and threw another pillow to the direction of the door, not knowing his partner had taken advantage of his moment of confusion to step away from his previous place. The pillow landed on the floor, making the guitarist smile slyly. 

‘Too bad, dear, that’s not where I’m standing anymore,’ Brian grinned, forgetting that he betrayed his position by speaking to Roger, who, over the course of the six previous months, had learned perfectly well how to figure out the position and direction of the people around him by simply listening to their voice. Brian only realised this when it was too late, for a pillow bumping against his side was inevitable.

‘I knew you would betray yourself sooner or later,’ Roger said with a self-satisfied smile on his face, firing another pillow at his momentary enemy. Brian caught it between both hands and swung it back at the thrower again.

‘Oh, you want to play it dirty?’ Brian asked, watching as Roger clumsily but effectively warded the flying object off with the palms of his hands.

‘You know I like all things dirty,’ Roger said jokingly, making Brian roll his eyes. This turned out not to be a good move; there was no one in the room to see the sarcastic gesture, and in the meantime Roger was given the time to launch a new pillow at Brian while the guitarist was caught up in his reaction to the remark.

‘You’re not as good at this as you used to be, Bri,’ Roger giggled when he heard the pillow connecting with Brian’s body – his hip, to be precise. Brian decided that it was time to turn the tables; Roger was practically defenceless now that he had spent most of his stockpile of pillows, not to mention that there was nothing the visually impaired drummer could do if Brian was to go after him.

‘ _What_ did you just say?!’ Brian asked him sternly. ‘I’ll show you who’s best at this! Come here!’ he demanded, walking towards the bed with heavy footsteps to make sure Roger could hear him nearing. It seemed to have an effect on the drummer, who emitted a shriek of both fear and amusement as he helplessly threw the last of his pillows towards him, but Brian had no problem warding them off and climbing onto the bed to go after Roger.

‘Brian!’ the drummer cried out helplessly when he understood Brian was serious about catching him. Roger tried to scramble off the bed, but Brian was able to conveniently grab the dark blue strap of his jeans dungarees and pull him right back on the bed again.

‘Freddie was right; these dungarees really are life-savers,’ Brian said, chuckling at Roger’s attempt to free himself from his grip. It had been their frontman who had introduced the idea of letting Roger wear dungarees, suspenders, or anything else containing straps so Brian had something to grasp onto when he needed to pull Roger away from a source of potential danger, but it turned out that the straps were also very helpful in scenarios like these.

‘No, let- let me go!’ Roger said, both desperation and laughter shining through his voice; he knew Brian wasn’t going to hurt him in a million years, but he probably understood what Brian’s plans with him were when the guitarist pressed him down on his back on the bed and swung a leg over to position himself above his hips.

‘Not before I’ve shown you who’s best at this game,’ Brian told him determinedly, sneaking his hand down to Roger’s waist and dragging his finger all the way down his hipline, the place where he knew his boyfriend was most sensitive. Roger let out a squeal at the touch, fruitlessly attempting to bat away Brian’s hand, something he only succeeded in by the time Brian decided it was time to move upwards and tickle Roger’s armpit instead.

‘Brian!’ Roger mewled in a combination of frustration and laughter; he couldn’t _stand_ the feeling of being tickled, but at the same time, like most people, he was unable to hold back his uncontrollable giggling either. Brian couldn’t help loving the sight of Roger in this position; his face twisted in helplessness, his hands clumsily trying to catch his, and his body writhing beneath Brian’s, all of which reminded him of the silly tickle attacks they randomly used to surprise each other with in the days when Roger was still able to see where he was putting his hands. Not that this had ever helped him much, Brian dimly thought; one drag of his fingers along the inner line of Roger’s hip had always been enough to make the drummer succumb to his touch in a matter of seconds. This time was a perfect example of how that continued to work after Roger had lost the ability to see.

‘This is u-ufair! _Pillow fight_ I said, not tickle attack!’ Roger cried out between helpless giggles, endlessly trying – and failing – to ward off Brian’s relentless fingers.

‘You are far too coherent. Maybe this will shut you up,’ Brian declared in response. Whereas Roger couldn’t see the wicked grin on his face, he sensed in the ominous tone in Brian’s voice that a whole new kind of attack was waiting for him. What he did _not_ know, though, was that this attack was a much more pleasant one than the tickling Brian had been torturing him with; instead of keeping Roger under his thumb with the use of his hands running all over his body, he screwed his fingers tightly around Roger’s upper arm and pressed his lips against his.

As could have been expected, Roger was surprised by this unforeseen display of affection; he at first tried to fight off Brian’s hands, which were tightly wrapped around his upper arms. But the moment his hands were joined by the feeling of Brian’s lips against his, he seemed to understand that this was not, in fact, another one of Brian’s attempts to gain control over his body in a cruel way. It was the complete opposite, and as soon as Roger understood this, he didn’t try to fight off Brian’s hands anymore, but instead let his body relax, closed his eyes, and simply let Brian kiss him, lovingly and passionately like only he could.

Brian felt his lips curl into a small smile the moment he realised Roger was giving in to his touch – and not only that, he was in fact actively participating in the act of kissing. He gladly pressed his lips against Brian’s, kissed him back just as enthusiastically, and followed Brian’s movements when the guitarist started moving his lips towards his cheek. What started off as a trail of kisses on his jawbone, soon turned into the act of making Roger smile by randomly placing kisses all over his face, which in the end turned out to be even more fun than the ‘serious’ business had been – especially when Roger attempted to simultaneously do the same to him.

Noses were bumping against each other, lips were missing just as many parts of the face as they were touching, and the last traces of the seriousness that had initially surrounded the act of kissing, soon were hard to find in the midst of giggles and ill-timed movements of their lips. It came to Brian’s mind that it had been quite a while since they had engaged in silly actions like pillow fights, tickle attacks, or simply kissing each other all over, but this scene proved that it had definitely been the right time to do this again.

When, after a few minutes of kissing each other as much as they were able in the midst of their fir of laughter, the two lovers found themselves lying next to each other in the now pillowless bed, arms tightly wrapped around each other and foreheads only just touching, Brian was the first of them to clear his throat and break the short silence between them two.

‘I had never thought me coming upstairs to check on you would lead to all of this,’ Brian said, with which he managed to bring the smile back to both of their faces. ‘But Roger, did you seriously abandon your homework, go through rooms and closets and chairs to collect pillows, sit down on the bed and wait for me to walk in to throw them at me?’ Brian said as to remind them both of which event had led them into the current situation.

‘That’s what it boils down to, yes,’ Roger responded. Then, as if he could intuitively sense that Brian was staring at him for any kind of further explanation, he added defensively, ‘I was bored with my homework after over an hour!’

‘I can see that, but how did you know I was going to go upstairs in the first place?’ Brian asked.

‘Because you always do so. You can never just let me be on my own for an hour; you always come over to bring me tea, ask if I need something, or simply to check on me and put on the lights because you don’t like the idea of me sitting in the darkness,’ Roger summed up, trailing his forefinger along the line of Brian’s chest while he spoke.

Brian blushed slightly; Roger’s attentiveness continued to amaze him time after time. ‘I’m sorry, I’ll leave you alone next time,’ Brian apologised, but it soon turned out that this was the opposite of what Roger wanted.

‘No, please don’t, I like to have you come in to check on me. I like the idea of knowing there’s someone out there who thinks about me,’ Roger admitted softly, pressing his head against Brian’s chest as to express that longed to be closer to him.

‘You know I always think about you,’ Brian reminded him with a smile. pressing a kiss against Roger’s blond tresses. ‘You are all that’s on my mind.’

Roger smiled before returning the favour – be it in his own way. ‘You also certainly cross my mind every now and then,’ he chuckled once he had pressed his lips against Brian’s chin.

Brian sighed audibly, grating his knuckles over Roger’s hair. ‘Oh, you are such a hopeless romantic, you know that?’

‘I am. I know you can’t resist it when I throw pillows at you and say I think about you every once in a while,’ Roger giggled, earning one more kiss on his cheek.

‘You really do know how to turn me on indeed,’ Brian said. ‘And before that will get out of hand, I think I should go downstairs again and let you finish your homework.’

‘You don’t have to go downstairs. In fact, I’d like it better if you stayed here,’ Roger murmured, burying his face in Brian’s chest. Brian ran his fingers soothingly through Roger’s hair; now that he really took the chance to look at Roger’s his pale skin and his curled-up body, it suddenly dawned on Brian just how worn out he looked after this long day of studio work, a doctor’s appointment, and sheets full of braille assignments. It was no wonder he had lost interest halfway through the last activity and instead opted for collecting pillows and waiting for him to check up on him so he could throw them at him; he had been in dire need of distraction, and this was not exactly the moment to leave him on his own to take care of his abandoned homework all alone.

But sill… ‘Really? I didn’t think you would trust me around you after that tickle attack,’ Brian joked.

‘Yeah, but I started the pillow fight, so I think we’re even,’ Roger reasoned.

‘That sounds fair. Come, let’s put the pillows back on the bed and take a look at your homework,’ Brian offered as he sat upright, hoping that the proposal of finishing the last of his assignments together would be the encouragement Roger needed. He softly nudged Roger in order to get him to sit up as well, but unfortunately, the drummer did not seem all too interested in getting up; in fact, he hardly moved a muscle and even kept his eyes closed as he replied.

‘We could also put the pillows back on the bed and lie here together,’ Roger mumbled, and Brian gave himself a second to think. Naturally he, being the most organised one of the pair of them, would have preferred to have Roger clear out all the homework as soon as possible. But then Brian glanced down at the more than tired boy in his arms, in combination with the thought of just lying there in bed with him… and once he had considered that, the decision wasn’t all that hard anymore.

‘That also sounds fair,’ Brian admitted. ‘I’ll go fetch the pillows,’ he said and carefully shifted away from Roger, who simply smiled in response. Brian looked through the room, put aside all pillows that did not belong in their bedroom and collected them on a pile right next to the door. Afterwards, he gathered the remaining pillows that looked most like the ones he remembered they had slept on the night before, after which he moved back to the bed again. He scooped next to Roger on the mattress, put his own pillow back on its designated spot again, and then placed Roger’s next to it so he could rest his head down on it.

‘Roger? Lift your head a little, baby,’ Brian whispered when his boyfriend didn’t move on his own, but when he also got no reply to this kindly stated order, he hardly needed to look at Roger to realise that he had drifted off during the time he had been rearranging their room.

The guitarist took a moment to simply appreciate the sight of Roger, turned half on his front, his eyes drawn close and soft breathing passing through his slightly parted lips. He had definitely been even more exhausted than Brian could have guessed, and as he saw his counterpart lying on the bed like that, he was glad he had given in to his proposal of sleeping instead of having talked him into making homework at this point in time.

With the tenderness one would normally use on a newborn or a baby animal, Brian carefully manoeuvred his hand under Roger’s head, putting him against the place he had been lying before – as closely to his chest as possible. Roger didn’t stir; he stayed perfectly sound- and motionless while Brian reached over to cover the two of them with the duvets and set the alarm clock a bit earlier for the morning after – the homework had to be done before braille class, after all. Not that this was anywhere close to Brian’s concerns when he, even more careful than before, pressed his lips against Roger’s temple, forgetting about the homework assignment altogether as he joined Roger in a peaceful sleep.


	10. Truth or Dare

‘Is that _really_ the wildest thing you’ve ever done on a first date?’

‘Why, yes! I couldn’t think of anything more daring than that.’

One look at the disappointed expression on Freddie’s face and the perfectly neutral one on John’s face after he had given a honest answer to the frontman’s question, was all it took for Brian to let out a snort of laughter. During an afternoon visits to their friends, Freddie had proposed to play truth or dare, probably in the hope of extracting some interesting stories from the rest of the band – and mainly from his boyfriend, of course. This was exactly why hearing that kissing a girl’s cheek in the middle of a darkened cinema was the most unrestrained thing John had ever done during a first date, was _somewhat_ of a disappointment to their ever-flirty frontman, to put it lightly.

‘Not good?’ John asked when Freddie remained awkwardly silent.

‘That’s just… not what I was hoping for,’ Freddie sighed. ‘I mean, don’t get me wrong. It’s adorably lame, of course, but not exactly very spectacular,’ he said, to which John started blushing. He was awkwardly toying around with the bottle they were all sitting around on the floor, obviously ready to get going again before his answer to the question he had been asked would turn into even more of an embarrassing situation for him.

‘What were you expecting to hear, Freddie? It’s _John_ you’re asking the question, after all,’ Brian interfered, laughing at the still more than slightly disappointed look on the face of their frontman.

‘I don’t know, but I surely expected more than giving a girl a kiss on the cheek at the end of a movie! _Certainly_ when taken into account what he’s like under the sheets nowadays,’ Freddie added, flashing his partner, whose cheeks had turned crimson red by then, a saucy wink.

Roger, not seeing but obviously sensing John’s uneasiness simply by the way he remained quiet after Freddie’s comments, decided to reach him a helping hand. ‘Why don’t you just spin the bottle again, Deaky?’

‘Yes, let’s just spin the bottle again,’ John quickly jumped in on the suggestion, glad to have found a way to escape from any more of Freddie’s questionably compliments. The bottle twirled around on the wooden floor a couple of times, before it eventually halted its movements, its neck unmistakably pointing at Brian.

‘It’s pointing at Brian,’ Freddie said to their blind drummer, whose eyes were fixed on the floor but who couldn’t make out where it was, let aside its position. ‘What’s it gonna be, dear? Truth or dare?’ Freddie asked.

‘I’ll also go with truth,’ Brian said while leaning back on his elbows, not exactly like the mood to get up for whatever task his fellow bandmates were going to come up with – certainly not after Roger had just been made to take a bite out of a bar of soap only a few turns ago. Brian was hoping for a somewhat decent question, preferably not invented by Freddie, whose assignments usually involved all the topics one prayed not to ever talk about – really, the frontman could _smell_ their fears, it seemed at times. It seemed like he made use of this talent right at that moment; much to Brian’s concernment, Freddie was the first to touch the bottle, meaning he had the right to ask the question.

‘What is the cruellest way in which you take advantage of Roger not being able to see anything? What does he not know you secretly do right under his nose?’ Freddie immediately jumped in before any of the others could take the change to ask their friend the question they had come up with – it seemed like he had prepared this question before the bottle had even announced that it was his turn in the first place. Brian turned around to first look at Roger, whose interest seemed to have been caught by this question that involved him, before he turned to look at Freddie.

‘You don’t even ask _if_ I take advantage of Roger’s blindness, you just automatically assume that I do,’ Brian chuckled, then paused for a second. ‘Well, the cruellest thing I do…’ he mumbled, a pensive frown forming on his forehead. ‘I’m not so sure, there are quite some things I do, but it’s hard to say which is worst from all of-’

‘Wait, what?’ Roger interrupted him with a touch of shock in his voice, bright blue eyes full of surprise meeting Brian’s. ‘There’s a whole _list_ of cruel things you do?’

‘Well, it’s not really that serious-’ Brian began explaining to his somewhat distressed looking partner, but Freddie had already heard an indication that there was going to be an interesting answer to this question, and he wasn’t going to rest before he would get it.

‘We’ll be glad to help you determine what is cruellest. Please elaborate,’ Freddie said with a wicked smile, and Brian pensively started answering.

‘Why, of course, I practically made him stop smoking after all these years by hiding his cigarettes, knowing he can’t find them anyway,’ Brian said, receiving a somewhat indignant snort from the person it concerned. ‘But that’s what he _knows_ of… most things he doesn’t,’ Brian confessed ominously, sparking the interest of all three men sitting around him.

‘Confession time,’ John announced with a bit of a smile, probably happy the attention had shifted from his awkward question to the interesting one Freddie had asked their guitarist.

‘Okay, well… I replaced the clock in the living room with one that doesn’t make any sound when an hour passes. If I then also make sure Roger won’t be wearing his watch, he has no clue what time it is, so I can send him to bed whenever I feel like it,’ Brian started off, receiving an indignant poke which ended up against his knee from his boyfriend and a chuckle from the other couple. ’ I can also always pick the biggest slice of cake for myself, or the best piece of meat, or whatever… I don’t always do this, but I can, whenever I feel like it,’ Brian continued. He then paused for a second to think about whether or not he should mention the thing that had come up in his mind, but soon decided to go for it. ‘I once accidentally burned a hole in the sleeve of his shirt while ironing it, so I rushed to the store to find something with the same fabric and fit. He hasn’t found out until this very day.’

‘Oooh, clever!’ Freddie cooed enthusiastically, but Roger did not seem to share this opinion with him.

‘Wait, which shirt was that?’ he asked Brian, who was glad Roger couldn’t see the smile on his face, as he knew for a fact it must have looked somewhat sadistic in the given scenario.

‘That’s the clue. I’m not telling you, babe,’ Brian answered.

‘That’s cruel!’ Roger whined in reply, the kiss on his cheek he received from his boyfriend as a silent way to ask for mercy not being enough to make him forgive Brian, certainly not when Freddie spoke up again.

‘You haven’t even heard the worst part of his secret businesses, I my humble opinion,’ Freddie said, and both Roger and Brian gave him a questioning look. ‘Something that’s going on right under our noses.’ Freddie gave a nod to the plastic cups on the floor in front of them to indicate what he meant when Brian continued to look at him as if he didn’t understand, which seemed to be enough for Brian to realise what he was talking about.

‘Oh, that!’ Brian acknowledged, then leant towards the man sitting to the right of him and added softly: ‘He’s not supposed to find out about that.’

Unfortunately, whispering did not prevent Roger from not hearing his words. ‘I heard that. What am I not supposed to find out?’ the drummer asked, both uneasiness and steadfastness audible in his voice. Even though he was afraid of what he was going to hear, he was determined to find out what it was that his friends were talking about, even if Brian wanted to keep the rest of the story from him.

‘Nothing, baby,’ Brian waved it away, but unfortunately for Brian, it seemed like not only Roger, but also Freddie was ready to get the cards on the table.

‘I think you’ll have to tell him now – you have to be honest while answering the question, and I truly believe this is the cruellest thing you do,’ Freddie interfered.

‘The cruellest thing _I_ do? You’re all cooperating with me! In fact, it was your idea!’ Brian reminded him.

‘What are you all doing to me?’ Roger asked, sounding seriously concerned by now as a result of the unnamed trick people were apparently playing with him.

‘Nothing, darling. Nothing to worry about,’ Brian soothed his boyfriend. ‘Whose turn is it?’ he asked in an attempt to move on, reaching out for the empty glass bottle but soon finding that Freddie had snitched it out of his reach. Brian gave the frontman a warning glance, but as he received the exact same thing in return, he knew he wasn’t making much of an impression – and that he definitely wasn’t going to win this battle.

‘Either you tell him or I do, dear. The choice is yours,’ Freddie said bittersweetly, giving Brian no way out.

‘Ugh, fine…’ Brian sighed, deciding he would rather tell it his boyfriend himself so he might bring the words a bit more careful, than have Freddie with his eternal love for drama confess on his behalf. ‘Roger, I’m not letting you drink anymore since that’s not a good combination with being blind, and I’m not supposed to be drinking either, to make it bearable for you, right?’ Brian started.

It did not take more than half a second for Roger to realise where this was going. ‘But you do?’

‘Well, you see, there are times when…’ Brian tried, but Freddie wasn’t having any of his vague story.

‘Most of the times he does; like right now, for example. Believe me, there’s absolutely no coke in his cup,’ Freddie chuckled, and Roger flashed a confused glance towards his partner’s direction.

‘What? But when we got here, you told Freddie you wanted a coke!’ Roger remembered.

‘That’s right,’ Brian said. ‘But we’ve… we’ve kind of set up a whole code system for alcohol, you see,’ Brian admitted, seeing Roger’s eyes widening in disbelief. ‘So, eh, Coke is our code word for beer, Fanta for wine,  tonic for… vodka, if I remember correctly,’ his voice trailed off, and Brian looked at the other plot members for confirmation or correction, the latter of which he received.

‘No, tonic is brandy. I believe tea is vodka – unless you two visit before four o’clock, of course,’ John snickered.

‘You three are the absolute worst!’ Roger interrupted their discussion about their secret code system. ‘I can’t believe you’ve all been drinking alcohol all along while I’m sipping from a glass of Coke,’ Roger pouted, before he tapped the nail of his forefinger against the item, only to find out that it wasn’t even the real thing. ‘Which isn’t even a glass but a plastic _cup_ , because Bri is convinced that I can’t be trusted with glass,’ he added sulkily, as if he had been greatly wronged – which, in a sense, he had been.

Freddie, who could not stand his friend being sad, was the first to react and at the same time give in to the drummer. ‘Ahw, don’t be sad! Do you want some vodka in your drink?’ Freddie proposed, to which Roger nodded powerfully. Freddie reached over for the bottle standing behind him under the table, safely stored away from Roger’s reach, but was stopped by Brian when he put the bottle down in front of him.

‘Freddie, that’s simply not happening,’ Brian told him sternly, but the frontman could not seem to care less about Brian’s opinion on his decision to finally get Roger something to drink.

‘Sorry, but I hardly think we can deny him any alcohol after just having confessed that we’re drinking it ourselves,’ Freddie told him while screwing the cap off the bottle and picking up Roger’s plastic cup. ‘Besides, we’re playing Truth or Dare. If I don’t give it to him now, he would just dare either of us to give him alcohol. Wouldn’t you, darling?’ Freddie addressed his other friend, pouring a generous amount of the alcohol in Roger’s half-empty plastic cup, filling it almost to the edge.

‘I would definitely do that,’ Roger giggled, but Brian was not in the mood to smile.

‘Freddie, not that much!’ he commented, leaning over to steal the bottle away from Freddie but the attempt being doomed to fail when Freddie quickly put the bottle back in its initial place.

‘To be honest, it feels very good to finally be able give him a _decent_ amount of alcohol after only being able to give him two or three sips of wine at crowded parties, when I was sure you couldn’t see us,’ Freddie said, the smile never vanishing from his face, especially not when Brian grumbled that he had always noticed this. ‘Look, here you go,’ Freddie said as he handed the cup back to Roger, who thankfully accepted it into both hands and wasted no time bringing it up to his lips.

‘Roger, you’re not drinking that, I’m serious. Hand me that cup,’ Brian said, but Roger simply looked up at him with his pretty blue eyes, keeping a perfectly straight and innocent face while eagerly slurping from the cup to which he clung with both hands, as if he was afraid it would be taken from him if he didn’t look after it properly enough – which sure was a possible scenario with a boyfriend who sheltered him the way Brian did.

‘Roger, you heard me,’ Brian said after a few seconds of silence in a somewhat louder voice, and Roger hummed in agreement, while at the same time not even decreasing the pace in which he drank the liquor.

‘Let it go, Bri. Let him have some fun,’ Freddie said on Roger’s behalf. Just as Brian opened his mouth to probably protest against this order, Roger removed the cup from his lips and put it down in front of him.

‘There you go, now you can have it,’ he giggled, and Brian snitched the empty cup away with a defeated sigh. There was nothing to be done about the consumed alcohol by now – and maybe, even though Brian hated to admit it, Freddie had been right about letting Roger have some fun after all this time of being absolutely sober. It was weekend, after all; there was no studio or braille class tomorrow, they were simply sitting in the living room and playing a game, Roger was surrounded by three responsible adults – well, _adults_ , that was; maybe this wasn’t the end of the world.

Without saying another word about the situation that would show that he had given in to his loss, Brian picked up the bottle and spun it around, and whether it was a coincidence or whether the devil had decided to make life hard on him that day, the bottle now pointed at Roger.

‘Roger, your turn,’ John announced. ‘Truth or dare?’

‘Dare,’ Roger answered without skipping a beat.

‘I don’t hope you’re expecting one of us to give you more alcohol as a dare, because that is not happening,’ Freddie told him right away, to which Roger laughed.

‘No, I’m not. Just give me something to do. Something _reasonable_ ,’ Roger added, obviously referring to the turn when Freddie had proposed he should read out loud a passage from some kind of obscene magazine he refused to tell them where he got it or why he had it in the first place, as if he had momentarily forgotten that reading letters that had not been translated into Braille was impossible for his blind friend.

They all thought for a second, but – to no one’s surprise – I was Freddie who again came up with the assignment. ‘Alright, we’re all going to change position, and then I dare you to kiss whoever you think is Brian.’

‘You sound pretty confident that I still want to kiss him after his confessions,’ Roger remarked.

‘I’m not, but fortunately ‘wanting to’ is not a necessity in this game,’ Freddie said while gesturing for the rest of the participants to get up.

‘Touché,’ Roger admitted, hearing the footsteps of his friends shuffling around in front of them but not managing to make out their positions.

‘We’ll sit down in a row in front of you,’ Freddie told him. ‘You can use your fingers to feel at our lips. Not the rest of our faces, that would make it too easy.’

‘Do you think that I, who could not see Queen Elizabeth even if she was standing right in front of me with her entire royal entourage, will be able to only touch your lips? I’ll be glad if I don’t stick my finger in someone’s eye,’ Roger said with a touch of obvious amusement, which seemed to work contagiously on the rest.

‘Alright, fair point,’ Freddie had to admit. ‘Just our face then, okay? Our hair would make it too easy. One feel of that dead chinchilla on top of Brian’s head would be enough to figure out where you have to be.’

‘Why, thank you!’ Brian said, tugging awkwardly at his curls.

‘Guys, if you don’t want me to discover your position simply by the direction your voice is coming from, you might want to be quiet,’ Roger reminded them. The three men quickly resorted to quietly getting up and finding themselves a new place on the floor to sit without another word.

‘Whenever you’re ready,’ Freddie whispered as they had redistributed themselves, just loud enough for Roger to hear yet too soft for him to determine where exactly the sound came from.

‘Alright, there we go,’ Roger said and got up from his cross-legged position on the floor, crawling over a few feet in the opposite direction until his hand bumped into someone’s leg. He now sat down again and reached out a careful hand to find the position of whose face. ‘I’m sorry if I end up poking out your eye,’ he apologised in advance, hearing something that could either be a muffled chuckle or a silent cry for help from whoever he was about to touch. The drummer was happy to find that he felt warm skin against his fingertips instead of the eyeball or nasal cavity he had been fearing for; it felt like someone’s cheek, and when he moved his finger towards the left, he felt the bridge of the nose. From this spot, he moved his finger lower, tracing the contour of lips of which the corners twitched up slightly at the somewhat awkward touch.

With a pensive furrow between his brows, Roger moved over to the person sitting next to his first subject, again bringing his hand up to feel at the predetermined areas but this time unfortunately almost sticking his forefinger in his victim’s eye. It resulted in a surprised ‘ow!’ and a series of helpless ‘I’m sorrys!’, after which Roger had a few quick feels at the jawline and the nose before moving on to his last and final subject. More careful than before, he carried out the same procedure; the frown on his face still full in force when he backed off slightly and glanced in the direction of his friends as if to figure out who was the one he needed.

After a moment of silence, Roger suddenly leant over to the person he had last been examining, and without another word, he pressed his lips against his. The chosen one seemed somewhat taken aback by the unexpected suddenness of the drummer, but, remembering the assignment, he simply went with it while the others quietly watched their every motion.

‘You could burn and replace my whole wardrobe with ugly clothes, never let me have the bigger slice of cake again, even hide my cigarettes for the rest of my life…  And still, just feeling your lips would be all I need to realise that I’ll _always_ want to kiss you,’ Roger pulled away for a moment to say to the person he rightly assumed was his boyfriend, before he pressed their lips together again. Whether or not he heard Freddie’s confirmation that he indeed had picked the right person, was something they were unsure of; he did not seem to need it in either case, since simply the feeling of Brian’s lips against his was all he needed to know he had been correct in determining who his boyfriend was. And even if it had not been a right guess, he assumed that his momentary counterpart would have withdrawn from him by now. But given that the person on the other side was enthusiastically kissing him back, he figured that it really couldn’t be anyone else than Brian. His lips stayed against Brian’s for quite a while, until Brian eventually put an end to it when the probing eyes of Freddie and John – which naturally had no effect on Roger – started to become somewhat awkward to the guitarist.

‘That was… elaborate,’ Brian judged when he sat back again, his fingertips touching his cheeks, which had reddened slightly as a result of the combination if passionately kissing while being watched by their friends.

Roger, on the other side, did not seem to be embarrassed by anything at all, as usual. ‘It must be the alcohol. I used to be able to handle it, but after not having been allowed to drink for months, it seems to hit me like a brick,’ he chuckled.

‘You little tease,’ Brian chided him, before he gave a sigh of defeat. ‘Why, then there’s only one solution; perhaps you should drink more often to get used to it again.’

‘Really?’ Roger asked, obviously not having expected this sudden concession.

‘Really,’ Brian said. ‘Let´s be honest, I can’t keep up with this code language and hiding alcohol wit bottles of cleaning detergent for the rest of my life.’

‘I would like to see that black on white,’ Freddie interfered.

‘No, that wouldn’t be any use for me. I’d rather have him solemnly promise that,’ Roger said, feeling around on the floor for an unapparent reason until he asked: ‘Where’s the bottle?’

‘Here it is,’ Freddie said and handed it over to him. ‘What are you going to do?’ he asked when Roger spun the bottle again, but instead of answering his question, Roger asked a new one.

‘Who’s it pointing at now?’ he said when the bottle had almost halted its movements.

‘That’s Deaky.’ Freddie replied, which was obviously not the desired answer, for Roger immediately brought the bottle into motion again. When it stopped spinning again, Freddie said: ‘Now you’ve spun me. Not good?’ he assumed when Roger spun again. ‘And now it’s yourself. John again… Now it’s Brian, at last,’ Freddie smiled, taking it that the last remaining member of their band was the one Roger was looking for.

‘Great. Truth or dare?’ Roger asked, but before Brian could even open his mouth, he added: ‘Please pick dare, otherwise I spun five times for nothing.’

Brian, understanding where this was going, simply went along with Roger’s plan. ‘Dare.’

‘I dare you to promise me to let me drink again,’ Roger ordered.

‘Unbelievable how you will literally use anything you can to get your way,’ Brian laughed, running his fingers through Roger’s messy locks of hair. ‘I promise.’

‘Let’s drink to that final breakthrough,’ Freddie said as he one by one pulled the handful of bottles of alcohol he had hid beneath the table, relieved to find that Brian would not protest against the plan this time.

 


	11. Chocolate and Getaway

**Blinded By The Light: Chocolate**

Roger peered over his shoulder one last time as to make sure that Brian wasn’t watching him, more out of habit than out of anything else; he naturally couldn’t see anything with his eyes, but he hoped that glancing in the direction of the door to the living room might help him focus on the sounds coming out of that area – that was, if there were any sounds at _all_. He hadn’t heard Brian move, cough, flick through the pages of a newspaper, or make any other sort of noise that would indicate his presence for quite some time, and the drummer was starting to wonder if he had moved over to another room. This would be unlikely, given that he would have heard it if Brian would have gone upstairs or outside, let alone if he would have come his way – not to even mention that Brian would always notify him if he was going somewhere else. Should he tiptoe over to the threshold to see if he could hear him if he was standing closer to where Brian supposedly was? Should he call Brian’s name to figure out where he was?

Roger quickly decided against both these ideas, judging that all the first one might do was betraying him by raising Brian’s suspicions if he heard him stumbling through the kitchen, and, worse than that, calling Brian’s name was most likely to immediately result in Brian coming over to check on him, which was the last thing Roger wanted if he wanted to carry out his dirty little plan. Therefore, Roger simply hoped that Brian would stay wherever he was at the moment while he placed his fingertips on the edge of the granite countertop, hoisting himself up as soundlessly as possible. He placed his knees, first right and then left, on the countertop, and pulled himself up on the handle of the cupboard above his head. Even though he couldn’t prevent a shaky moment in which he almost lost his balance, Roger was rather pleased with his skills. He had done this dozens of times before when he hadn’t been able to reach something, both when he had still been able to see, and after he had lost his vision. It was quick, effective, and, as long as Brian – who had never been a big fan of this technique – wouldn’t find out, a perfect strategy to reach for what he needed.

Roger carefully leant back to open the cupboard he remembered Brian usually stored biscuits, sweets, and chocolate, among some small household goods. He then reached out a careful hand to quietly roam through the contents of the cupboard; with his fingers he felt a roll of adhesive tape, a measuring cup, something that felt like pot-holders or oven gloves, and some other completely random items he did not need at the moment. He frowned and searched through the stack of coffee filters and pack of sugar cubes, hoping not to make too much noise when he started to move the items to make way for further investigation of the closet. Eventually, he felt his fingertips bumping up against the well-known biscuit tin, and he knew he was getting somewhere.

Just when Roger heard the crinkling of tinfoil right where his fingertips reached a rectangular product that led him to believe he had found what he had been looking for, two strong hands appeared from out of nowhere and placed themselves around his sides, quickly and effectively tugging his body off the countertop.

‘Ah! Let me go!’ Roger squealed at the unexpected touch and motion, struggling to break apart but not being let go of until both his feet had been placed back on the floor, which was probably a better solution than the being-let-go-of that Roger had pleaded for. Fingers closed around his lower arm and he was spun around so quickly that it disoriented him for a moment. He would have feared he would have tripped over his own feet, had it not been for Brian, who was holding him ever-firmly and thus prevented him from going anywhere.

‘Damnit, Roger, you nearly gave me a heart attack!’ Brian cried out, and Roger felt his lower arm being pulled towards Brian, a thin, lean finger soon connecting with the back of his hand and leaving a short but stinging pain behind. Roger winced shortly; not because receiving a rap on the knuckles seriously hurt, but because he naturally hadn’t seen it coming. And, even more than that, he knew this was Brian’s way of punishing him not so much for having broken some serious rule, but for putting himself in unnecessary danger, something he knew Brian found to be way worse. It was what Brian always did when he had found Roger using knifes, scissors, kettles, or the like without his permission or supervision; tear whatever the object of potential danger was away and giving him a warning flick against his hand as some kind of substitute to the pain he could have inflicted on himself had he cut, burned, or spilled anything over himself.

‘I told you not to do that anymore, didn’t I?’ Brian asked, and Roger nodded powerfully with a sound that was somewhere between a whimper and a dry sob. He could sense that Brian’s face was close to his when he felt a hand being placed on either of his shoulders, and Roger held his breath when his lover spoke, afraid Brian was going to give him a serious scolding for having done something he knew he wasn’t supposed to. Luckily, it seemed like Brian felt no need to dwell on on the part that Roger hadn’t been listening to him, and instead moved towards preventing this from happening again.

‘Promise me not to do that again, baby,’ Brian urged most kindly and patiently. ‘You know it’s dangerous to climb up the countertop in your situation and I don’t want you to pull off such life endangering stunts just for a bar of chocolate.’

Roger suddenly glanced up at Brian when he heard him spoke that last part of the sentence. ‘Who says I was looking for…’ he started, but he knew it was useless when he heard Brian chuckling.

‘Babe, I’ve known you for a while. What else would you be looking for in this cupboard? Coffee beans? Paper clips?’ Brian asked, and Roger felt his cheeks starting to glow. He opened his mouth for a reply, but closed it soon after when he realised that he did not really have one; there was no use trying to deny that he had been looking for the chocolate bar, and certainly not to Brian, who always seemed to understand his ways, aims, and intentions without Roger ever mentioning them. Brian could read him like an open book, which at the moment was not exactly convenient to Roger.

‘Alright, you’ve got me. I was looking for the chocolate,’ Roger admitted, positive that the blush on his face grew even worse when he said that.

‘You know you could have just asked,’ Brian told him, his voice soft and kind like only his could be, instantly making Roger wonder why he had been stupid enough to do this behind Brian’s back. Even though it didn’t make sense anymore right now, he did know _why_ he had chosen to climb up the countertop instead of simply asking, and decided that he could better be honest to Brian right away.

‘I know, but I was afraid you’d say no. We’ve just had lunch.’

‘Darling, when was the last time I said no to you?’ Brian asked. ‘Probably somewhere back in September when you wanted I’m in Love with my Car on the B-side of Bohemian Rhapsody. And even _then_ you still got your way in the end.’

This memory managed to pull a smile from Roger’s face at last. ‘As I always do if I just keep pushing,’ he said, feeling comfortable enough to throw his arms around Brian’s neck, a feeling that only grew when Brian’s arms slipped around his waist.

‘You’re _terribly_ spoiled, you know that?’ Brian mumbled, pressing his lips against Roger’s messy blond hair.

‘And whose fault is that?’ Roger threw back at Brian, who just chuckled.

‘Probably mine. I can never say no to you,’ Brian answered, knowing there was no one else to blame beside himself for Roger being used to getting his way. Today proved to be absolutely no exception when Roger pulled out his sweetest voice to ask him the question that had probably been on his mind for some time by now.

‘So am I still getting that chocolate bar?’

‘Sly little devil. Well, looking at what I just stated, I’m afraid I can’t say no to that,’ Brian said, carefully pulling apart from Roger’s grip to fetch the bar of chocolate before the drummer would have the chance to go after it himself again. Being considerably taller than his boyfriend, Brian had absolutely no problem picking up the desired item without doing as much as standing on his tiptoes.

‘Here you go,’ Brian said as he handed the treat over to his now brightly smiling boyfriend, giving a good-natured swat to the seat of his jeans. ‘Go to the living room to enjoy it while I rearrange the contents of the cupboards.’

‘Sorry, did I make a mess out of it?’ Roger inquired.

‘You did, but letting you clean it up would probably only result in more of a mess, so I guess I’m going to have to take care of it,’ Brian said, hoping to let Roger feel a tinge of guilt that would stop him from trashing through their closets the next time, but it seemed to have the opposite effect on him.

‘So whatever kind of chaos I make, you’ll clean it up to save yourself from having to clean up even more afterwards? Interesting,’ Roger grinned.

‘Don’t try me, or I’ll replace all the chocolate in the house with bars of soap next time,’ Brian threatened, which seemed to be all he needed to talk the idea out of Roger’s head – the drummer quickly retreated to the living room, leaving Brian in the kitchen to clean up the cupboard.

The guitarist swung open the kitchen cabinet to inspect the damage Roger had caused. It was nothing serious, certainly not when compared to the thought of what damage Roger could have inflicted upon himself, but the pile of coffee filters had toppled and the whole shelf had to be cleared of all contents before Brian could wipe away the sugar that had gotten all over the place.

‘Those child safety locks on cupboard doors might not even be a bad idea,’ Brian mumbled to the empty kitchen, allowing himself to chuckle before he got to work.

**Blinded By The Light: Getaway**

Every band had good and bad days, and it only took a handful of minutes for Brian to find that today was most _definitely_ one of the latter category.

The guitarist hardly looked up anymore when Roger quit his drumming right in the middle of a track for what must have been at least the third time in a row, making the rest of the band abruptly break off their work also. It failed to surprise him that this happened again; in fact, he had been anticipating this breakdown of music to happen again after Roger had started to lose his rhythm mere seconds before. The song they were currently recording was not an easy one, and perhaps they were asking too much of their blind drummer, certainly this early in the morning.

‘Roger,’ Freddie sighed, putting his microphone down on the mixing panel. ‘This was the third time.’

‘I know. I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me today,’ Roger answered, putting his drumsticks aside to rub his eyes, as he had been doing for a while. He hadn’t been having a good night and it was showing, even though the drummer didn’t want to admit this.

‘He’s just tired,’ Brian told Freddie on Roger’s behalf. ‘He hardly slept at all last night,’ he added, seeing how both the frontman and their bassist flashed Roger a glance full of concern, whereas this was apparently the _last_ thing Roger was looking for.

‘I’m not tired,’ Roger protested.

‘Not tired? Babe, I literally had to pull you out of bed this morning, you fell asleep in the car, and you’ve been doing nothing but yawning, rubbing your eyes and losing your focus all morning,’ Brian told him and the rest of the band, much to Roger’s discontentment.

‘I didn’t fall asleep in the car, I was just looking out of the window,’ Roger said.

‘Sure you were,’ Brian chuckled. ‘Just admit that you’ve had a bad night. It doesn’t matter, it happens to the best of us.’

‘I didn’t have a bad night, I’m perfectly focussed. I can do this,’ Roger told him, fumbling to pick up his drumsticks and urging his fellow musicians to join him. Brian brought in that all he was doing was wearing himself out by forcing himself to play right now, but Roger wouldn’t hear of it. The tension in the studio was nearly tangible when they started playing again, and when Roger, as expected, fell out of rhythm or had to stop playing altogether thrice in a row, Brian put down his guitar to put the session to a halt.

‘I’m sorry guys, but I think we’ll have to pick this up later. Someone is obviously too tired for this at the moment,’ Brian said, and even though it sounded not in any way accusatorily, Roger immediately jumped in to defend himself.

‘I’m not too tired!’

‘You’re right, you’re exhausted,’ Brian corrected himself. ‘We’re going home and-’

‘No, we’re staying here,’ Roger interrupted him.

‘-And you’re going back to bed,’ Brian finished his sentence as if no one had never made him halt his speaking.

‘What? It’s ten o’clock, I’m not some kind of toddler that needs to sleep in the middle of the day,’ Roger told him, but the tears of either frustration or tiredness – perhaps a combination of both – in the corners of his eyes were not exactly supporting his statement.

‘Roger, you should see yourself. You’re as white as a sheet and on the verge of tears. You know just as well as I do that you need a break from work,’ Brian said sternly. He quickly flashed a glance at the other couple, who so far had not seemed to have the courage to mingle in their discussion.

‘But we have to finish this track!’ Roger said, raising his voice by now.

‘ _Tomorrow_ we’ll finish the track. We’ll give it another try when you’ve caught up some sleep,’ Brian decided, standing up from the tip-up chair he had been sitting on. ‘Freddie, Deaky, I hope you don’t mind that we’re leaving – we’re not really any use to you in this state anyway.’

‘No, no, don’t worry about it,’ Freddie said after a few seconds of silence, not seeming to have been prepared to answer a question after silently having listened to the quarrelling of his friends. ‘There’s no hurry to finish this anyway.’

‘See? There is no hurry to finish this today, so we might as well go home and do this when you’re feeling better.’ Brian into the back pocket of his trousers to produce the car keys, just the sound of them clattering against each other being enough to make Roger object.

‘But Brian-’ Roger whined, but Brian wasn’t having it.

‘No contradiction, Roger. We’re going home and that’s the end of it,’ Brian said. He walked towards the pianoforte over which they had thrown their jackets no more than an hour ago, throwing his own coat around his shoulders and giving Roger the one that belonged to him. Roger refused to put it on or even take it from him, and Brian sighed audibly.

‘Don’t be like this, Roger. I have no patience for this at the moment,’ he grumbled, and when Roger still made no visible efforts to get up, Brian simply grabbed his arm and pulled him back on his feet. He received an indignant cry containing only his name from Roger and a concerned glance from John, but as no one said anything after this, Brian simply said a goodbye to John and Freddie and urged Roger to come along. Not waiting for the drummer to make up his mind about whether he was going to cooperate with him or not, Brian simply grabbed Roger’s hand and the drummer sulkily followed him outside. The two of them didn’t exchange a single word until they were inside the car again, where Brian leant over to fasten Roger’s seatbelt when his boyfriend made no attempt to do so himself. Roger wiped the tears away from his eyes, giving Brian a sideway glance.

Roger glanced over his shoulder, as if this would be to any use of him to determine if Freddie and John were out of ear- and eyeshot, before he asked: ‘Do you think they were buying it?’

‘Buying it? Lord, you should’ve seen the look on John’s face when I pulled you out of your chair!’ Brian told him. ‘It’s such a shame you couldn’t see them, I think they’ve never been more convinced in their lives, I’m telling you,’ Brian laughed, and Roger couldn’t help joining him.

‘God, I would have loved to see that,’ Roger sighed with a smile on his face.

‘It wasn’t showing at all that you were messing up the track on purpose – it seemed very real. Not to even mention those fake tears… I thought Freddie was going to join you.’

‘Really?’ Roger said, a touch of excitement in his voice that was hardly appropriate as a reaction to hearing you almost made one of your friends tear up. But Brian, being just as happy their dirty little plan had worked out perfectly, wasn’t the one to tell him so.

‘Yes, really! I initially feared mainly Freddie was going to give us a hard time, but he melted like butter the moment he saw you sniffling. You did wonderful, baby,’ Brian praised him.

‘So did you. You improvising about me having fallen asleep in the car really made way for our _‘discussion’_ ’ Roger added with a chuckle.

‘Really, who thought that discussion was all it would take to sneak out of the studio?’ Brian asked.

‘I didn’t, but I’m glad it was,’ Roger answered.

‘Why, let’s go home now for some ice cream and TV, and let’s see if we feel more in the mood for recording tomorrow,’ Brian suggested, turning the key of the car around and starting the engine.

‘And if not, we now know their weak spots,’ Roger snickered, receiving a kiss on his cheek from Brian before they drove away from the studio with a smile similar to the one they had showed up with that morning just after having coined their evil plan.

 


	12. The Ring

‘These are the most _stupid_ daisies I’ve ever encountered in my life.’

Roger’s whiny voice broke the almost perfect silence in the park, and Brian looked up from the sandwich he was taking bites of to cast a glance at his boyfriend. Roger was lying on the red and white-checkered tablecloth Brian had brought along to use to sit on, but he should’ve known better than that; Roger would always find alternative purposes for conventional items. This was why the by now almost empty picnic basket was standing in the grass while the drummer, laying on his front, was sprawled all over the surface of the tablecloth, leaving only just enough space for Brian to not have to sit on the cold, wet ground as well. It was a beautiful  day, but it was still early, and the dew on the bright green grass hadn’t vanished yet.

‘What can possibly be wrong about daisies, dear?’ Brian pondered out loud.

‘They break or tear every time I try to split their stem,’ Roger grumbled. Brian looked at the small, white flower with pulverised stem that Roger was holding, his eyes following the poor daisy when Roger put it down beside him on a small pile of equally abused-looking flowers.

‘You shouldn’t use both your nails to split them; their stem is too small to fit that without breaking. You should just use one thumb,’ Brian instructed. Roger looked a bit sceptical, but he decided to give it a shot anyway. Brian saw him pressing the nail of his right thumb through the stem, more carefully than he had done before.

‘Like this?’ Roger asked as he briefly turned around and stuck the hand with the daisy out towards Brian, who examined it thoroughly.

‘Much better.’ Brian smiled, sneaking a careful hand under the hem of Roger’s striped shirt, gently caressing the bare skin of his boyfriend’s back. The soft, downy hairs of the skin rose at the touch of Brian’s cold fingertips, but the drummer didn’t protest against the chilly feeling; instead, Brian heard him emit a shivery sigh and felt him relax the muscles in his back, indicating that Roger was completely surrendering to his actions.

Brian continued caressing Roger’s back and watched the somewhat clumsy fingers pulling out a handful of grass, searching for the few daisies it contained, and going back to puncturing the stems of it again. Even though Roger was facing the other way, Brian could almost see the concentrated expression his blind partner would pull off whenever he was working on something that demanded precision; the slight furrow that would form between his brows and the way he would bite down his bottom lip as part of his routine for delicate tasks like these. Roger’s fingers worked to push the stems of a number daisy though the perforations he had created, and much to his excitement, it seemed to work.

‘Look, Bri!’ he said, turning over to his back and pushing himself up on is elbows, holding the handful of entangled flowers out in Brian’s direction. But it was not so much the craftwork that caught Brian’s attention; it was the smile on his face and the sparkle in his eyes that stole Brian’s heart.

‘It looks very good,’ Brian commented. ‘And to see you enjoying yourself is even better,’ he added, leaning forwards to Roger and taking his face between his hands to plant a kiss on both his cheeks. Roger blushed slightly at the unexpected display of affection, but he did not hesitate to press a kiss against Brian’s jawbone in return, something that never failed to bring a smile to the guitarist’s face. Roger got down on his front again and resumed his work, and Brian found his fingers crawling under the hem of his boyfriend’s shirt again by their own account. He looked up at the cloudless sky, the barely-there rustling of leaves of the trees in the park, and the morning sun that emitted a light that was only just strong enough to feel its glow on your skin. Everything around them gave Brian the impression that today was going to be a beautiful day in late August – a perfect day for the plan he had in mind.

While the fingertips of his left hand were still stroking the warm, milky white skin of Rogers back, his other hand wandered off to the picnic basket, sneaking it in and blindly searching through it as soundlessly as possible. On his quest to the bottom of the basket, he encountered a half-empty bottle of juice, a crushed paper box that used to contain strawberries, and the remains of a tuna sandwich wrapped in tinfoil, before he laid hands on the item he had been looking for. He carefully took out the paper box and put it down next to him. Out of habit, he glanced at Roger to make sure he was not looking at him before he opened it, even though he knew it wouldn’t matter if he did. Roger couldn’t see what he was doing anyway, and even if he did, he would probably mistake the product Brian had just fished out of the basket as being part of their picnic. Knowing Roger’s nosiness and his tendency to experience the world with his hands now that his eyes were no use to him, Brian had safely packed the actual item in a carton container, just to make sure Roger wouldn’t recognise it if he started fiddling through the contents of the basket. This turned out to be a great decision; Roger had indeed been rumbling through the breakfast food and cutlery in an unguarded moment, but the ordinary paper package had saved the surprise for the moment Brian had intended to unveil it, which was right now.

Brian removed the carton package and carefully place the delicate white box down on his lap. With slightly trembling fingers and his eyes constantly peeking at Roger to see if he was still amusing himself with the task of creating a daisy chain of some length, Brian lifted the cover to check if the contents were still the same. He had been checking this at least twice a day from the day of the purchase until the instant he was sitting here, next to his lover, as ready as he could possibly ever be for a moment like this. He had rehearsed what he wanted to say endlessly, had written it out, practiced it in front of the mirror, but he felt like nothing could _really_ prepare you for the moment you were actually alone with your unexpecting partner, just waiting for your own courage to allow you to speak up to him.

‘I think it ought to be long enough by now,’ Roger broke the silence between them, instantly awaking Brian from the daydreams that clouded his mind. He intuitionally flipped the box close, praying the sound wouldn’t make Roger suspicious. The drummer seemed not to notice as he was way too occupied with tying the endings of the daisy chain together to make an actual necklace out of it.

‘Does it look somewhat decent?’ Roger asked, turned towards Brian again but blind to the things that had been keeping Brian busy while he had been toying around with the flowers.

‘It’s very pretty,’ Brian said with a smile, taking Roger’s fabrications into his hands. It surprised him at times to see what Roger, be it with a little assistance, was still capable of doing; from nearly impossible tasks as picking up his life as a musician again to smaller things like crafting with flowers in the park, Brian was incredibly proud of all things he attempted and often succeeded in.

‘It’s for you. If you’d like, of course,’ Roger added a bit insecurely, but his face lightened up when Brian leant over to kiss him and ruffle his hair.

‘I’d like that very much. Thank you, baby,’ Brian answered. He glanced at the present in his lap, and after a short moment of pondering, he decided that this might be a good moment to jump in on the topic. He closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, and said: ‘Speaking of which, I also have something for you.’

‘Really?’ Roger asked with audible surprise, in his voice and the guitarist nodded in confirmation, before correcting himself by speaking his answer out loud.

‘Yes, I do. It’s just… something small, something I’ve been wanting to give you for some time now,’ Brian said to make it sound like less of a big deal, whereas it was, in fact, a huge deal for him, and hopefully also for Roger. ‘Could you, eh… maybe sit up? Sit across from me?’ he asked somewhat awkwardly, not exactly sure how to go about doing this now that the moment was really there.

‘If you’re willing to tell me where exactly that is, sure,’ Roger snickered as he pushed himself up, sitting cross-legged in front of Brian, who decided that it was easier to change his position himself than to give Roger directions.

‘That’s much better,’ Brian commented. ‘So what I wanted to give you… Or tell you, to start with, actually,’ he corrected himself, cursing himself for his awkwardness at a moment like this. He looked up from his lap to find a pair of blue eyes looking hopefully at him, and even though he knew Roger couldn’t see him, he still made an effort out of hiding his reddening cheeks with his hands.

‘Yes, baby?’ Roger encouraged him in that soft, kind voice of his, and Brian took in a deep breath before speaking again.

‘Okay, what I wanted to say… We’ve been together for quite some time now. Five years, to be precise,’ Brian started, but he stopped when Roger covered his mouth with his hand as he heard this.

‘Oh God, please don’t tell me I missed our anniversary... What date is it today?’ Roger’s voice was slightly panicked; Brian could see the shock in his eyes, and he was glad to be able to tell him that this was not at all the case.

‘No, no, you didn’t. It’s not the twenty-seventh yet, don’t worry,’ Brian said, a slight smile forming on his face. ‘But in the light of our upcoming anniversary, I wanted to ask you something…’ Brian said, noticing himself how his voice trailed down towards the end of the sentence. Clearing his throat, he continued: ‘We’ve been together for almost five years, and especially the last year wasn’t easy. In fact, I think I speak for both of us if I say it was the hardest thing we’ve ever been through together,’ he said, his voice reduced to a whisper. Roger didn’t dare to face Brian as he spoke, without mentioning the actual word, about the accident that had turned their whole lives upside down, and for this reason, Brian wanted to get rid of this topic as soon as possible.

‘But at the end of the day, I believe that everything that happened has brought us closer to each other than we’ve ever been. The past year has been a constant challenge, but I think we came out stronger than before,’ he said, looking up at Roger to see how he responded. When the drummer nodded in agreement, Brian continued: ‘I’ve come to realise, even more than before, that you mean everything to me and that I would do anything for you.’ Roger was still nodding at him, softly whispering that he would do the same for him, and Brian took Roger’s hands between his own. He felt his heart pounding in his chest by bow; the moment of truth was now upon them, and Roger seemed to understand where this conversation was going the moment he had picked up his hands.

‘I could never love anyone as much as you, Roger, and I want you to know that I’ll always be yours. So I’m asking you if you… if you would accept this gift as a… a sign of love and unity. To let you know that I’ll always be by your side.’ His voice were starting to fail him by now, so Brian opened the box, took out the ornament on the left side of the box, and placed it in the palm of Roger’s hand, waiting breathlessly for Roger to respond to it.

Roger seemed frozen for a moment, but he soon managed to clear his throat and speak. ‘Is this… what I think…?’ Roger asked in pure disbelief, touching the small, circular object with the fingertips of his left hand as if he was almost too star-struck to believe that he really just had been given this.

‘If you think it’s a ring, yes, you’re correct,’ Brian confirmed his suspicions, and Roger covered his mouth with his hand. He looked up at Brian with his blue eyes wide in disbelief and astonishment, opening his mouth to say something but soon after pressing his trembling lips together again. He glanced down at the place where Brian had put the ring in the palm of his hand, and he carefully ran his fingertips along it as to make sure that this really was happening. Brian heard him whispering a soft _‘oh my God’_ under his breath as he did so, and he soon figured out why this was.

‘There is… there is text on it,’ Roger whispered in awe, his fingers moving along the dots on the silver band. He swallowed thickly before he spoke, and Brian could swear he saw tears in the corners of Roger’s eyes when his boyfriend read out loud: ‘it says _together_.’

‘I went to a jeweller to have it made,’ Brian explained. ‘Yours says _together_ , and mine says… well, you can feel for yourself, if you’d like.’ Roger shifted closer and reached out a trembling hand, and with a bit of Brian’s aid, he managed to place it on the ring in the palm of his hand, shakily feeling at the raised dots on the silver ornament. By the time he had made out the word on Brian’s ring, the tears were dripping down his cheeks. Brian attempted to wipe them away, but Roger hardly seemed to notice; he was transfixed on Brian’s ring, which perfectly matched the inscription of his own.

‘It says… _forever_ , I believe,’ Roger sniffed, wiping across his face with the back of his hand.

‘Together forever. It’s a relief to know that my efforts to learn braille are finally starting to pay off,’ Brian whispered, and Roger smiled through his tears, allowing Brian to pull him closely against his body and finally letting himself go. Brian held him tightly against his chest, patiently letting Roger cry his heart out on his shoulder. It felt so good to be so close to him, to have Roger clamp onto him for dear life and to know that he trusted him completely. But as the rings still lodged in the palms of their hands, safely guarded by their fingers clutching around it instead of around their fingers, where they belonged, Brian was not yet completely reassured.

‘Please tell me you’re crying because you’re happy,’ he whispered in Roger’s ear, and he felt the drummer nodding powerfully against his shoulder.

‘I am. I’ve n- never been this happy before,’ Roger sobbed, and Brian blinked against the tears in his own eyes. He had never thought that his gift was going to make way for so many emotions at the same time; sadness and frustration about what had happened to Roger, happiness towards how far they had gotten, and above all the unconditional love he felt for his partner.

‘So am I right to assume that you’re accepting my ring?’ Brian guessed. When Roger nodded heavily again, Brian felt a wave of relief washing over him. He had hardly been able to sleep at night and had been nervous all morning just by the thought of asking Roger to accept his proposal of sharing this sign of unity between the two of them, even though he had known all along that Roger wasn’t going to refuse the offer in a million years. The love between them was strong and true, and the accident had not strengthened their bond because Roger now depended on him, but because they had truly learned to love and appreciate each other even more than before during the hard times they had been going through together.

When Roger’s sobbing was starting to subside, Brian carefully created more space between them and brought Roger’s hands closer to his.

‘Can I?’ he asked delicately, and Roger, intuitively knowing what he was talking about, gave him his silent approval by nodding once again, not yet trusting his voice to speak. Brian opened the hand Roger had been using to cling onto the small treasure he had been given, picked it up between two fingers, and placed it around Roger’s finger. He was glad to find that it fit like a glove, and that a smile started to break through on the drummer’s face the moment he felt the ring being put on its designated place. But what was even better, was that after this, Roger placed his hand on what ended up to be his lower arm, and moved it down until he reached his fist. His fingers touched Brian’s, and Brian did not need to think twice about what he had in mind; he simply opened his hand and let Roger return the favour of placing the ring around his finger. With as much precision as he was capable of with his currently shaky hands and non-existent eyesight, Roger let the ring slip around Brian’s finger, after which he was pulled closer to the guitarist again for another kiss.

When they pulled apart again after a while, Roger placed his hand against Brian’s to make their fingers touch. Their faces were mere inches apart from each other when he asked his partner: ‘How do we look together?’

‘Beautiful. Like the couple we’ve always been and always will be,’ Brian replied.

With a small, insecure smile, Roger said: ‘I remember the time right after the accident, when I was so afraid you would leave me. I was praying for my eyesight to come back, because I thought you’d… leave me if I would be permanently impaired.’

‘Oh, darling, of course I would never leave you!’ Brian said, feeling his heart skip a beat when Roger spoke those thoughts. Even though he had heard many times before how badly Roger had feared being left alone, it continued to send shivers through his spine whenever his boyfriend told him about these fears. ‘I would never leave you, and this ring is the token of that. I promise I’ll stay with you until the day you send me away.’

‘I do hope you realise that day will never come for as long as I live,’ Roger informed him.

‘That’s what I was hoping to hear,’ Brian smiled, quickly pressing his lips against Roger’s. Then, as he glanced down at the white box and the daisy chain in his lap, he added: ‘And if I ever threaten to leave you, you can simply chain me down with daisies.’

Roger chuckled at that comment, plucking a few flowers out of the grass next to the red and white checkered cloth. ‘And to think that you taught me the right technique to do that… You’ve been digging your own grave, Bri,’ he giggled.

‘Of course, as I always seem to do…’ Brian snickered. ‘But as long as it’s you chaining me up, I don’t even mind it that much,’ he added, receiving a playful poke from Roger, which he assumed was aimed at his side but ended up against his hip.

‘I’ll make you regret saying that,’ Roger said. ‘While you would lie there all chained up, I’ll eat the last tuna sandwich,’ he said, and before Brian could even react to Roger’s words, the drummer’s hand had already disappeared into the basket, pulling out the tinfoil containing the treasured sandwich.

‘You little… oh, you can have it, if you like. As long as I can have you,’ Brian said.

‘Deal,’ Roger agreed, and Brian watched as Roger unwrapped the small package, both the tinfoil and the silver ring around his finger blinking in the morning sunlight.


	13. Collection

**Toothbrushes**

When Brian opened the door of the bathroom and switched on the bright overhead LED-light, the silhouette of his boyfriend standing at the sink with his back turned towards him nearly had him jump up. There was a lot he had accustomed himself to since he had been living with a blind partner – using plastic tableware instead of china, having all sockets in their house covered by child-proof shutters, endlessly opening and shutting child safety gates when going up and down the stairs – but walking into a room he had thought to be empty and switching on the lights to find Roger being there, was not something he expected himself to grow used to anywhere in the near future.

‘Roger, what are you doing here?’ Brian asked.

‘Sorry, did I scare you?’

‘A little. It’s okay,’ Brian said, even though he could still feel his heart pounding against his ribcage. ‘It’s more you brushing your teeth that scares me, to be honest.’

‘You’ve never seen me brush my teeth during the past five years?’ Roger chuckled, and Brian joined him.

‘No darling, I just meant I’m just not used to you voluntarily going to the bathroom to do so,’ Brian corrected himself. Roger, corresponding to the standards of stereotypical rock stars, had never been a big fan of going to sleep, and having to get changed and brush his teeth before this was even more of a drag to him. It was usually Brian who had to usher him to the bathroom at some point in the evening to strip him out of his clothes, hand him over his toothbrush and put him in bed if the guitarist wanted this to happen _at_ _all_. This was why finding Roger, already clad in his pyjamas and with a toothbrush in his hand, surprised him as much as it did.

‘Why, I was tired,’ Roger said as he removed the toothbrush from his mouth for a moment so he could talk. ‘We have to get up early tomorrow to make the studio appointment on time… I thought it might be a good idea to get ready to go to bed,’ Roger shrugged innocently.

‘Very sensible. I think I’ll join you with that,’ Brian said, leaning over to plant a kiss on Roger’s cheek, before he reached out to pick up his toothbrush from the plastic cup next to the water tap, but he stopped halfway through the act.

‘There is just one thing,’ Brian frowned lightly.

‘And that is?’ Roger lisped through a mouth filled with the toothbrush and white toothpaste foam.

‘That is not your toothbrush.’

 

# # #

 

**The Test**

_This drabble was written for my best friend Marja, who has a major kink for bearded Brian May (sorry not sorry for sharing this with the world, babe)_

‘Brian?’

Brian cut off the yawn halfway through the act to look at the direction of the sound and finding his boyfriend standing in the kitchen door. It surprised him that he hadn’t heard his partner coming down the stairs; either Roger had finally decided to put effort into descending the stairs, which was unlikely, or Brian himself simply hadn’t been paying attention, which was a much more plausible case. It was seven o’clock in the morning and he was still very sleepy, and he had been putting the small amount of power he felt like he possessed in his limbs at that time of the day in the act of making coffee.

‘Good morning, baby. I thought you were still sleeping,’ he said to Roger, who, on bare feet, carefully tiptoed over to him on the cold kitchen tiles.

‘I certainly feel like I’m still sleeping,’ Roger mumbled as he was standing in front of Brian, one hand clinging to the countertop to retain his balance and the other one rubbing his eyes. Brian put the coffee filters he so far had been holding in hands aside and took the tired drummer in his arms, kissing the top of his head.

‘You also look like it. I was just making some coffee for you, maybe that will help you wake up.’

‘That’s really sweet of you,’ Roger smiled. He pulled away slightly to be able to return the favour of kissing Brian, but right after he pressed his lips against Brian’s cheek, he immediately broke touch with him again. ‘There’s something on your face,’ Roger frowned, reaching out a careful hand to touch the place where is lips had been, gently prodding his forefinger against Brian’s cheek.

Brian had to touch his face for a moment before he realised what he was talking about. ‘Oh, sorry. I probably should’ve told you I’m growing a beard.’

‘Really?’ Roger asked with an unmistakable touch of excitement. ‘Since when?’

‘Since just a few days. It’s not much more than a stubble yet,’ Brian said as he rubbed over the short yet certainly tangible hairs on his face.

‘How come I didn’t notice?’ Roger wondered, his fingers still stroking the bearded skin of Brian’s jaw as if he had never felt anything like it.

‘Because it’s usually me kissing you, I think. And when you try to kiss me, it usually lands on my hair, or on my collarbone… That’s how I managed to keep it a secret,’ Brian chuckled, and Roger smiled timidly.

‘Was it supposed to be a secret?’ he asked.

‘No, not really. But I didn’t mind it that you didn’t seem to find out at first – I wasn’t so sure what you were going to think about it,’ Brian admitted.

‘Well, as I can’t see it, there’s only one way I can really judge whether I like it or not,’ Roger said and he stretched on his tiptoes to press a kiss against Brian’s cheek. The guitarist smiled at the sudden action; though he was shy in public, Roger could be adorably affectionate when they were on their own. His smile only widened when Roger pulled away again to say: ‘So far approved. I just need to know what it feels like the other way around,’ he said.

Brian did not need to hear this twice; he immediately leant in to kiss both of Roger’s cheek and ended it off with a kiss on his forehead. ‘How’s that? Did I pass the test?’

‘Part two also approved,’ Roger told him pensively. ‘Just one more subject to go.’

‘And what do I need to do to pass the last test?’ Brian asked.

‘Nothing special, just our usual business between the sheets tonight,’ Roger replied cheekily, and Brian grinned.

‘I’m gonna pass this test _cum_ _laude_. Pun intended,’ Brian whispered in his ear, pressing one last kiss against Roger’s cheekbone.

**# # #**

**The Walking Cane**

_Lots of people wanted Sandy to come back to the fics, so here she is!_

‘Roger, would you care to go outside for a walk?’

Brian was already standing in the doorpost of the hallway with his summer coat loosely thrown over his shoulders, assuming Roger was going to agree to his proposal of going outside after having been staying inside the house for most of this beautiful late September day already. Roger, who was slumped all over the sofa, a practice sheet of braille in one hand and the other hand on the button of the portable radio next to him on the table, looked into Brian’s general direction with what seemed like a spark of interest to the guitarist.

‘Yes, maybe I could practice with my cane for a bit,’ Roger thought out loud, putting the sheet of paper down on the table and pushing himself up into a sitting position.

‘That’s what I was thinking,’ Brian said, taking a step back into the hallway to pick up Roger’s coat also.

‘So we’ll leave Sandy here, I assume?’ Roger asked, and Brian upon his return to the doorpost glanced over at the dog that was lying on the carpet between the sofa and the table, clenching her teeth around a toy of which the guitarist couldn’t quite make out what exactly it was from his position next to the door. She however seemed very absorbed in it; even when Roger leant over to pet her exhaustively, she did not look up from her toy. Brian decided that this might come in as a blessing – if Sandy was occupied with something that distracted her from paying attention to them, Roger and he could just sneak outside, and would not have to go through the process of putting the by then always miserably yelping Labrador in her cage, which, even though this had to be done on a daily basis, would never fail to break both their hearts.

‘Maybe that’s a good idea, yes, so we can focus on you instead of on Sandy running circles around us and tying us up with her leash in the process,’ Brian snickered, and Roger joined in – even though it had never been as bad as that, it would not surprise either of them if Sandy’s energetic and playful nature would one day land them into such predicament.

Roger gave Sandy one more pet, before he stood up from the sofa and walked towards the direction of the door. Brian moved aside to let him pass when Roger approached him with one arm stretched out in front of him to feel for the doorpost. He handed the drummer his coat, watched him kneel down to tie his shoelaces into some kind of improvised knot Brian was positive he’d never seen before, and helped him get back on his feet when all of this had been said and done. However, when Brian reached out to pick up the walking cane he was sure had been standing right next to the dresser, he grabbed into loose air; there was nothing to be found. He turned around to see that the spot was empty and moved over to the other side of the dresser, where he also found no sign of the cane.

‘What’s it?’ Roger asked, by now having picked up Brian’s quietness and walking around the hallway as being a sign that there was something wrong.

‘Did you move your cane last night?’ Brian asked while already in the process of opening the drawer.

‘No, why would I?’ Roger sounded surprised by the question.

‘I don’t know, but I thought that might explain why it’s not where we left it,’ Brian answered. Roger frowned, and quickly joined the quest for the desired item by skimming the area beneath the drawer and the coat rack in the hope to find his red and white cane somewhere there, but both their efforts were in vain; neither of them could find even a sign of it in the hallway.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Roger said while propping himself up on his hands after just having been lying in front of the radiator in search of the lost cane. ‘I’m pretty sure we put it down right here last time we used it.’

‘Then it can’t be far away. It should be somewhere here…’ Brian murmured more to himself than to anyone else as he opened the door to the living room, hoping to find the lost item somewhere there. Moving to the living room to continue the quest seemed to be something he should have done right away, because one trip around the table was enough for Brian to find what they were looking for.

‘Found it!’ Brian said, loud enough for Roger to hear him. ‘I’m just afraid we’ll have no other choice than to take Sandy with us if we want to practice with your walking cane.’

Roger soon after appeared in the doorpost with dust all over his jeans and a confused expression on his face. ‘Why would we need her for that?’

‘Because she’s the one carrying it.’

 

**# # #**

**Shopping**

‘How much longer is this going to take?’

Brian felt multiple fingers prodding at his left hip, before they moved to clench themselves around his shirt and tugged impatiently at the hem of it. It hardly made him look up from the rack of clothes he was flicking through; unless the shop assistants had been given new and rather shameless instructions for approaching potential customers, it could be no one else than Roger who was currently trying out the stretchiness of the clothes he was wearing.

‘We haven’t even been here for longer than fifteen minutes,’ Brian answered, his eyes not leaving the shirt he had just found that he thought might be something for his partner.

‘That’s fifteen minutes too long,’ Roger complained, and Brian chuckled. Before he had gotten blind, it had always been Roger who had dragged _him_ into clothing shops against his will, but it seemed like the tables had turned – it was now Brian who had to pull Roger along from store to store. Brian could imagine that shopping was not much fun for his blind partner; it still wasn’t his favourite hobby either, and it never would be either. But after Roger had managed to wear out three shirts over the course of the last two weeks, one by burning a cigarette hole in it, one by spilling tomato sauce over it, and one by having leant against a wall at school that had just been painted (let’s be honest there, who would expect _that_ to go without consequences at an institution for the visually impaired?) Brian hadn’t seen any other option than to take him out shopping, whether he liked to or not.

And _boy_ , had Roger been making it pretty clear to him that he wasn’t enjoying himself. From verbally objecting to pulling at his clothes and simply settling down on a chair somewhere in a shop with the message that he wasn’t going to move anymore – Brian had seen it all over the course of the past two hours.

‘I hope you do realise it’s only going to take longer if you keep distracting me like this,’ Brian said in response, receiving an eye roll, which was Roger’s way of indicating that he knew Brian was right but couldn’t get those words past his lips.

‘So what should I do to put an end to this shopping trip as quickly as possible?’ Roger asked rhetorically, as if he needed explanation to understand that simply cooperating with Brian was the one and only recipe to get this shopping trip over with as soon as possible.

Brian, endlessly patient – or at least attempting to be so – answered: ‘You could try this shirt on, to start with.’ He pulled the dark blue garment he had been looking at off the clothes rack and pressed it into Roger’s hands. The drummer seemed displeased with this suggestion; he hated fitting clothes in clothing stores with a burning passion now that he couldn’t see what it looked on him anyway, and voiced his complaints about this right away. Brian however wasn’t having any of it and sent him off to the changing room anyway, watching as Roger sulkily obeyed him and finally allowed him a moment of rest, which he was in serious need of after having put up with Roger’s behaviour for the past two hours. During this time, they hadn’t found more than a simple long-sleeved white shirt, and Brian could point at no one else but Roger for the source of the delay. Apart from not being cooperative when it came to fitting clothes, he also continually voiced his complaints about the handful of shirts he had bothered to try on; they were either too short, too long, too tight, too loose, too itchy, or whatever reason he could come up with. Brian oppressed smile a while he wondered which complaint Roger was going to have in store for him this time; whether the fabric would be too static, the sleeves too broad, the fit too uncomfortable… Or if he would finally let go of all these classic complaints Brian had heard about a thousand times before and come up with something more creative that might make actually manage to make Brian chuckle instead of just roll his eyes at his boyfriend’s pickiness.

It stayed quiet for a remarkably long time; Brian could see the shadow of Roger’s silhouette moving behind the curtain, but there were no voiced indications of rejection this time. When after multiple  minutes Roger still hadn’t given him any reaction whatsoever, Brian decided to check on him.

‘Is everything going alright in there?’ Brian asked, and a vague mumble that could either be a yes or a no followed as to answer him. Brian waited a little longer, until he eventually got up and  walked towards the changing room.

‘Roger, can I come in? Or haven’t you found something to complain about yet?’ Brian snickered, expecting to receive a sneering answer to that, but it was quite the opposite.

‘I don’t know,’ Roger said, sounding somewhat thoughtful now. ‘I think there’s something wrong with the neckline.’

Brian, not having remembered anything peculiar about the upper side of the shirt he had handed over to his boyfriend, moved the curtain aside and stepped inside the small space that was separated from the rest of the store after which he pulled the long piece of fabric back to where it used to be again to give them some privacy. Once he had properly pulled the curtain back to its initial place, he took a look at Roger, who was standing before him with a displeased look on his face while he pulled at the front neckline of the article of clothing Brian had made him put on. It was exactly this ‘I-told-you-this-wasn’t-going-to-work’-expression on Roger’s face that made it even harder for Brian to oppress his laughter while he tried to reply calmly.

‘It’s not the shirt that’s something wrong with, it’s most likely to be your fingers,’ he told his boyfriend with a wider growing smirk on his face.

‘Fingers? What do you mean?’ Roger asked bepuzzled as he brought his hands closer to his face, as if this would help him see what Brian was talking about.

‘Because they couldn’t tell the difference between the _front_ …’ Brian said and demonstrated this by pulling the small bundle of size- and washing advice labels out of the front of the neckline of the shirt, ‘and the _back_ of the shirt,’ he added when his hand had travelled to Roger’s back, where he gave a pull at the _actual_ front side of the shirt’s neckline, and tickled Roger’s neck right below his hairline, where he knew Roger was sensitive. Roger let out a helpless yelp at the touch and brought up his hands to cover his neck from any further attempts of his boyfriend to tickle him, of course not seeing that Brian had already pulled back his hands and had no intention to tease him again.

‘Why do you always have to tickle me?’ Roger asked indignantly.

‘Why do you always have to test my patience when we’re out shopping?’ Brian threw back at him.

‘Alright, you win,’ Roger admitted after a short silence in which he had probably been trying – and failing – to come up with a better, sassier reply to his boyfriend.

‘And what is my prize for winning?’ Brian asked.

‘I’ll put on this shirt correctly. And if it feels good, I’ll take it without complaining about it,’ Roger proposed, which was an offer Brian gladly agreed to.

‘And if you do, we can finally go home. A win-win situation for both of us,’ Brian added. Roger seemed just as enthusiastic about his idea; he was quick – although at the same time clumsy as usual – to wring his arms out of the sleeves and turn the shirt around to wear the shirt the way it had been intended to be worn.

‘It feels kind of good, to be honest,’ Roger said approvingly once he had it on properly. ‘How does it look?’ he asked while spinning around so Brian could see the potential new asset to his wardrobe from every side.

‘It looks great on you,’ Brian said, nodding at the sight of his partner dressed in the navy blue shirt he had suggested for him. It truly looked amazing on his skinny frame, and on top of that, both of them agreeing to buy it now meant they could finally go home and leave the clothing stores with their endless racks of identical looking options and pushy salesclerks behind.

‘Great. I suggest we go to the cash register to pay for this, and then go home to put this shirt through one more test,’ Brian said as he picked up Roger’s own shirt, which the drummer of course had sloppily discarded all over the floor of the changing room.

‘And that is?’ Roger asked as he clumsily tried to throw the soon-to-be-purchase over his head.

‘Seeing how quickly I can rip it off your body,’ Brian whispered, and Roger, after stopping and listening as to hear if no one was eavesdropping on them, smiled back at him.

‘Why wait with that until we’re home? I’m struggling with it right now, you might as well help me out here,’ Roger suggested with a wink. Brian could do nothing but silently agree by pulling the curtain that separated them from the salesclerks that he hoped were not wondering what the two of them were doing in a single person changing room all this time, and pinned his consenting boyfriend against the back wall of the small space. Following Roger’s example, he first stopped and listened to hear if the coast was clear, then when he deemed it to be safe outside started tearing at the hem of Roger’s shirt like Roger had done to him at the very beginning of this shopping trip, which at last seemed to be getting an interesting twist to it.

 

# # #

 

**The Restaurant**

‘You know they put a knife and fork at either side of the bowl for you, right?’ Brian informed Roger when once again more rice landed on his lap than survived its way to his mouth through the chopsticks the drummer insisted he should use. Roger had never been gifted with a natural talent for eating with chopsticks, but bow that he couldn’t see either the thin bamboo sticks or the rice he was trying to place between them, his attempts to eat in authentic East-Asian fashion were doomed to fail. Whereas everyone at their table in the Japanese restaurant had long accepted that it was far more practical for Roger to toss aside the chopsticks and simply pick up the cutlery he was used to, Roger was the last person to give in to this proposal.

‘Thank you, I’m quite aware of the usual position of cutlery according to standard British etiquette,’ Roger replied drily while making another go at scooping up rice with the chopsticks, only to lose all of the rice before it had even left his bowl.

‘You really wouldn’t be the first person ever to eat rice with a fork, honestly, if that’s what you’re worried about,’ Freddie joined the conversation.

‘And you also won’t offend the staff, if that’s what troubling you. They gave you cutlery themselves, before I could even ask for it,’ Brian remarked, positively surprised by the attentiveness of the waitresses, whereas Roger didn’t seem to appreciate the sign for reasons none of the band members had yet considered.

‘Because it’s really that damn obvious that I’m blind, right?’ Roger snapped as he threw his chopsticks down next to his bowl, now facing Brian’s direction with a more than mildly unamused look on his face. The rest of the band – and possibly also the rest of the restaurant visitors – looked up at the boy who had just raised his voice in public, but this was the last thing Brian cared about when Roger made it _pretty_ clear how he felt about the help strangers were kindly offering him. ‘The moment I walk in I’ve already been labelled as helpless and useless and unable to function properly by people who know _nothing_ about me!’

Brian, deciding that this wasn’t the best moment to argue that he indeed looked rather helpless with grains of rice spread all around his placemat, asked Roger: ‘Darling, what is all of this suddenly? The staff was just trying to be helpful!’

‘I’m not here to make people feel better about themselves because they helped a disabled-’ Roger went off, but his voice suddenly dropped when Brian placed his hand on Roger’s upper leg, comfortingly rubbing circles on his thighs. Roger sighed deeply at this unspoken sign that he had to take in a deep breath and think for a second about what he was doing, and in the end calmly reached over to pick the chopsticks he had just thrown aside up again. ‘Sorry, it’s nothing. I just… sometimes realise how different I am from normal people,’ he mumbled.

‘A ‘‘normal’’ person I have yet to meet,’ Brian commented while still chewing on the piece of salmon sushi he had just put into his mouth the moment Roger had seemed to calm down again.

‘You know what I mean, Brian,’ Roger told him calmly yet with an edge of lingering irritation in his voice, and Brian realised this was not the time to play with Roger’s unspecified use of language if he did not want to have the drummer throw his cutlery around the room like he used to do with drum sticks, beer bottles, and drum kits back in the days when he was still blessed with the gift of eyesight.

‘Of course I know, babe,’ Brian hushed, swallowing the remainders of the piece of sushi and softly patting Roger’s leg. ‘Listen. You to know that no one in here wanted to make you feel uncomfortable by giving you cutlery. They were just being considerate, because that’s what you do when you see that someone needs it, right?’ he asked, and Roger stared at his lap, a vague gesture of his head indicating that he agreed with Brian but could not voice the words after just having lashed out verbally. ‘And no one will think less of you if you can’t eat with chopsticks because you’re blind – _especially_ when you’re blind,’ Brian added.

‘No one apart from myself, you mean,’ Roger whispered with a touch of self-disgust that made Brian feel queasy – just the idea of Roger disliking anything about himself made him feel like he was failing as his partner and his task of making Roger feel like he was perfect, inside and outside – just as how Brian thought about him, whether his lover was blind or not.

‘Darling, you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself!’ Freddie cried out from the opposite side of the table before Brian could even come up with a reply. John soon joined in too, leaving Brian to think for a moment and come up with a plan that might actually make Roger feel more supported than having three people with eye sight lecture him about how not being able to see was no big deal.

‘Come on, I know how to make you feel better. Waitress?’ Brian called out as he turned around to face the room while he raised his hand in a subtle way to attract attention from the staff.

‘What are you doing?’ Roger hissed at him.

‘If you’re so convinced you look like a fool eating rice with cutlery, we’re all going to join you in looking like fools,’ Brian hissed back before he turned to the young woman who had shown up at their table. ‘Can I please get cutlery for the rest of us?’ he asked, and the woman nodded politely before she walked to the kitchen to execute the request.

‘Sounds like a good idea,’ Freddie said, already putting his chopsticks aside.

‘But why would you want to look like a fool when you can just eat with chopsticks? Like you’re _supposed_ to do?’ Roger asked his friend.

‘To support you, silly. If one of us has to look like a fool, we’ll all join them and look like a bunch of fools together. That’s what we’re friends for, right?’ Freddie asked.

‘You don’t have to embarrass yourselves just to-’ Roger tried, but surprisingly, it was John who managed to get him to finally shut up about the whole topic.

‘Roger, I voluntarily joined a glam rock band. I’ve done nothing else than embarrassing myself all day long for the past four years,’ the bassist said, after which he was the first one to accept the cutlery their waitress offered him. Roger was clearly struggling to find a reply to this overly honest and most of all painfully true statement, giving the rest of his band the time to exchange their chopsticks for the cutlery they were more used to in their everyday life.

‘To have you know, the staff did not look at us as if we were some kind of degenerated species because we asked for cutlery, Roger,’ Brian told him only mildly teasingly when the waitress had made her way back to the kitchen again.

‘Probably because they’re used to Westerners eating like barbarians after having owned a Japanese restaurant in London for some time,’ Roger muttered, his hands awkwardly approaching his own cutlery, touching it shortly but never really picking it up.

‘Well, now that we all look like barbarians according to Roger… shall we?’ Freddie asked.

‘Alright then, if this is what you guys insist on…’ Roger said as he finally shrugged it off when the whole band had been supplied with knife, fork, and spoon – and even surrendered to using the last mentioned tool himself after all. ‘We might all look like a bunch of philistines, but at least I can’t see any of it,’ he said when he scooped up some by now half cold food with his spoon, finally managing to bring a decent amount of rice up to his mouth in one go for the first time that night.

 

# # #

 

**Counting Stars (warning: sexually explicit)**

_If you are not willing to see this content, please stop reading now. If you are among those who have been horny for some sexually explicit Maylor scenes, be my guest and go ahead!_

Roger had never thought he was going to see stars again, but he liked to think that it was inevitable when having an astronomer for a boyfriend. It was not that this former profession of Brian’s was directly involved in the process of Roger seeing again, nor did he get to lie his eyes on the actual astronomical bodies, such as star signs, star clusters, or the like. It were more of the abstract kind of stars; it were shards of light somewhere in the sea of darkness, blindingly sharp compared to the colours – or lack of colours – Roger was usually experiencing before his dysfunctional eyes. While they had first started off as little dots of lights showing up like far away stars on an unclear summer night, the stars had increased to a level where they were now bright, hot, bold, and anxiously exciting, exactly matching the situation Roger found himself in at the moment.

‘Brian…’

Roger realised that he had called out his boyfriend’s name just as many times as there currently were stars dancing before his eyes, but he couldn’t help himself; not when Brian was treating him like this. With his sweat-slicked skin against his own, a hand greasy with Vaseline around him, a mouth whispering sweet promises and even sweeter sin into his ear; it was so much, too much, and yet it was not enough by far. It was enough to leave him hanging on the brink, forever increasing his frustration, the frequency at which he begged for release, and the density of the by now blindingly sharp simmering of those stars.

‘Tell me what you want,’ Brian whispered demandingly against the shell of his ear, but all Roger could do was groan helplessly; something that only got worse when Brian licked a wet trail along his jawline. He loved it when Brian was like this; he was usually sweet and understanding and endlessly patient with him in their everyday life, but once they ended up under the sheets and Roger gave him a free pass, Brian could become so demanding and inflexible in giving him what he wanted. And even though Brian liked letting him hang on for tantalising minutes, quarters, or even hours, even though it could all be so fucking _frustrating_ , Roger loved every second of it.

‘I want… I want you, Brian, _please_ -’ Roger choked out, before he was cut off by the feeling of Brian pressing himself deeper up inside of him, a hot jolt of what felt like liquid fire shooting up his spine, momentarily cutting off his breath. Once he regained his ability to breathe, Brian did it again, and again, and _again_ , messing up his breathing rhythm until Roger was reduced to tears of frustration and intense pleasure beneath him. He tried to wipe them away, but he could not bring up his hands anymore; it was as if they had been glued to the mattress beneath him, and he was completely surrendered to what Brian had in mind with him.

Luckily for Roger, the sight of tears appearing in his eyes was a sign for Brian that it was time to bring it to a well-deserved and satisfying end. He tightened his grip around the underside of Roger’s dick and stroked him, simply stroked him teasingly while keeping up with his pace of pressing himself inside of Roger, and repeating these movements a few times was all the drummer needed to give in with a piercing cry, coming all over Brian's hand in hot, pulsing spurts. Roger vaguely noticed Brian's mouth curling into a satisfied smirk against his jaw, his free hand smoothing over his hip, but the feeling of pure ecstasy running though his veins was overpowering all physical touches and the current quivering of his body. All he really felt is the pleasure, the relief of sexual tension that had been building up for way too long, and of course, the stars that were now brighter than they had ever been before. They were overwhelmingly present before his eyes; they were bold,  flickery, consumed all of his attention and focus, and reduced him to an almost life- and motionless doll until they ebb away after a few long-lasting but fully enjoyable minutes, taking the brilliantly satisfying physical aspects of finally getting relief after having been kept short for what felt to be an entire night along with them.

It was obvious how Roger felt about the physical tinges of pleasure leaving his body, but he didn’t know how to feel about the stars slowly starting to disappear into the endless darkness that stretched itself out wherever he laid his eyes; he didn’t know if he had to be relieved to return to the status quo after being all shaken up by the pure sight of... of _light_. Even though the apparitions would have looked like nothing more than tiny balls of liquid lighting up to any other person, they were of overwhelming value to Roger; they were the only things, entities, masses, colours, or whatever one wanted to call it, that he had seen since the moment of the accent. This was at the same time also exactly why these star-like appearances a scared him; lights and fire had been the last thing his eyes had detected before they had been distinguished by these exact forces forever.

This realisation made Roger shake his head to himself as to get rid of this more than slightly unpleasant flashback, and he tried to concentrate on his surroundings instead. Knowing that Brian was lying next to him, instantly made him feel a lot better; Roger could hear his shallow breathing and feel the hot, damp skin of Brian’s arm resting against his shoulder. The drummer propped himself up on one elbow as to look at him – more as to make sure Brian knew he was going to say something to him than for his own sake, because frankly, no matter which direction he was facing, he would never see any of it anyway. 

‘Do you remember when you didn't want to do anything in bed for six months? Too afraid it would hurt me?’ Roger brought up in the stillness of the bedroom in a still slightly raspy voice. He heard a huff of more than slightly embarrassed laughter coming from his boyfriend; the time Brian insisted on refraining from all forms of sex seemed impossible to even imagine now that they were getting at it almost every night and at other convenient – and inconvenient – points at their day if possible. Still, they of course both remembered those months of complete abstinence, and Roger was positive that he was speaking on behalf of both of them if he would say that neither of them desired to go back to that period in time.

Roger suddenly felt a gentle hand on either of his shoulders, carefully pressing him back against the mattress. He felt Brian swinging a leg over and carefully positioning himself above him, after which both hands disappeared from their initial place. One of them rested on his chest, slowly dragging a nail across his nipple, which turned hard and sensitive; the same story applied for his cock the moment Brian’s other hand reached down to slowly crawl towards it. Roger couldn’t help pressing his lower body up against Brian’s magic touch and pushing his head back into the pillows below him. Brian leant in to lick the damp skin of his throat, slowly moving up towards his jawline.

‘Brian… please…’ Roger moaned, his fingernails clawing weakly at the crumpled sheets below him while Brian pressed their chests together to minimise the distance between their bodies – something which, once he was finished and had lied down on top of Roger completely, could only further be achieved if they would crawl into each other’s skin.

‘Allow me to make up for that,’ Brian whispered closely to his ear, and Roger nodded feverishly, having decided by now that those stars might even be what he was going to enjoy most about this upcoming physical and emotional rollercoaster ride he would gladly let Brian pull him through for the fourth time that night.

 _If he goes on at this pace, he might make up for the entire six months in just one evening,_ Roger thought dimly, before the feeling of Brian’s hot, moist lips travelling down to the body part that needed them most right now cut off all of these hypothetical thoughts to exchange them for reality.

 


	14. Heatwave

Brian had never been a big fan of warm weather, but finding himself trying to fall asleep after failing to do so for hours in a stuffy bedroom on one of those hot and dense end of July nights, were those moments when he _really_ realised just how much he hated heat. It was as if every year during the winter, he forgot just how much he couldn’t stand the high temperatures that typically accompanied the summer season, only to discover his dislike for warm weather over and over when June showed up on the calendar to introduce itself and its unbearable temperatures. And the moment he was right in the middle of one of those heatwaves, like right now, Brian felt like he could _curse_ the sun for even existing. The astrophysicist voice in his head popped up to remind him that human life would be impossible without the help of UV light and the warmth the sun radiated, but Brian was positive that if it had been possible, he would crumble the sun with his bare hands, regardless of the consequences for planet Earth and its inhabitants.

Brian turned around for what had to be the fiftieth time of that night, weakly lifting up his head to look at the alarm clock. It was almost one AM, and still it seemed to not be completely dark outside. Brian didn’t know if it really still was somewhat light outside or if he had been lying in bed staring into the unlit room for long enough to adjust his eyes to the darkness and be able to make out the shape of things around him, but whichever of the two it was, it annoyed him. Like everything about this freaking heatwave that had been going on for days in a row was starting to annoy him. Waking up all sweaty, the water being lukewarm whenever he turned on the tap, having to pluck his clothes off his sweat-slicked skin all day long, feeling the need to shower every two hours because the heat made his body feel sticky and made his sweaty curls cling to his neck and face, every piece of fabric feeling like it was made of woven treads of liquid heat…

The realisation of fabric folding itself around him, made Brian kick the remainders of the thin sheets they had been using as blankets lately – now that actual blankets could probably cause a heatstroke – off the bed in a helpless attempt to cool himself down. He knew it was useless; he had not allowed them to come even close to his feet, let alone that he would actually lie down underneath them. It was more the need to kick something because he was feeling so frustrated with being tired but being unable to sleep in the stuffy bedroom, bathing in his own sweat while the ceiling fan buzzed endlessly as it spun around a thousand times without bringing as much as a cold breeze of air. He felt the tendency to get out of the bed that felt like it equalled the temperature of their stove in the winter, jump on top of it, and tear at the fan until the damned device would never spin again. Unfortunately, he know he was going to regret doing that to their rented house, and secondly, he did not want to disturb Roger. He had seemed to be on the brink of falling asleep last time he checked, but now that Brian turned around to look at him again, he saw that the drummer was staring at the ceiling with his eyes wide open, as if he had given up on trying to fall asleep. Brian did add a mental note to himself, though, that holding his eyes open did not necessarily mean Roger had given up on attempting to doze off; whether he had them open or closed, he could see nothing with them anyway. For half a second Brian wished he could swap with his boyfriend’s condition so that he did not have to be annoyed by the semi-darkness in their room, but then immediately felt guilty afterwards, knowing that this one moment of wishing for complete darkness was incomparable to involuntarily being left without eyesight for the rest of one’s life.

To get his mind off the matter, Brian resumed his list of things that annoyed him about the heat. Next to the lukewarm water and his sticky curls hanging in his face all the time, there was also the excess of laundry because he felt the need to change out of his sweaty clothes thrice a day, the pace with which he ran out of sunscreen because his skin colour was equal to that of a ghost, never being in the mood for dinner because the _last_ thing he wanted was to eat anything above the temperature of refrigerated food in this heat…

And just while Brian decided at the end of his internal rant that things could not be much worse than they currently were, it turned out that this was totally possible; two hands were placed on his shoulders, Roger slipped closer towards him, and before Brian could even say a word of it, his boyfriend had already nestled himself against his sweaty chest, positioning his damp, long hair and clammy fingers against his body at the same time. Brian felt like he would pass out from a heatstroke right there and right then.

‘Mmmh… Roger…’ Brian groaned, weakly drying to detach himself from his clingy boyfriend, which only caused Roger to tighten his grip around Brian’s naked torso. They had discarded their shirts somewhere long ago – Brian had even thrown it off the moment he stepped into bed, immediately sensing that wearing more than boxers was not going to be realistic that night. It had been a relief to finally be able to rid himself of his trousers and shirt that night; they had been clinging uncomfortably to his skin all day long, and Brian had been hoping that throwing all of it aside would make him sweat less. Unfortunately, he had had to trade his short sleeved cotton shirt for the silky soft duvet covers and a mass of entangled sheets, and it had not taken more than a few minutes for Brian to be feeling just as warm and sweaty as he had before. Roger currently lying closely against his upper body was only adding up to the unpleasant sensation of feeling like he was on fire, and Brian wished he would let go of him.

‘Roger,’ Brian repeated his boyfriend’s name a bit more serious now, now finally eliciting a reaction.

‘Yeah?’ Roger replied casually, pretending he had no idea what Brian was going to say.

‘You know how I feel about cuddling in bed when it’s twenty-nine degrees outside,’ Brian mumbled, but the heat had drained all the strength out of his muscles, so he could do nothing more than sluggishly giving Roger a few nudges to make it clear that he had to stay at a respectable distance. Not that this was enough to make Roger back away, of course.

‘And you know how I feel about cuddling in bed. Always and everywhere,’ Roger said with a smile as he snuggled even closer against his unwilling partner. When Brian’s attempts to gently push Roger away did not get him anywhere, he eventually chose to take some real measures and simply turned over to face the other side of the room.

‘Brian…’ Roger sulked right  away as he shook his shoulder, but Brian was not planning on moving back to his previous position as long as he knew Roger would immediately start jumping onto him as soon as he did.

‘Sorry, baby. It’s too hot for this right now,’ Brian mumbled in an apology as he snuggled into his pillow to make sure Roger would understand he was trying to fall asleep – until he remembered Roger was blind and would not be able to see this hint.

‘But I can’t sleep, and I want to cuddle with you…’ Roger protested weakly, but he didn’t seem to do anything about it this time; the hands on Brian’s shoulder blades even disappeared. Just when Brian was about to close his eyes again now that he had turned to face the other side of the window, he felt fingertips feeling at the small of his back, after which they groped around his waist, wriggled themselves around his sides, and met in front of Brian’s torso.

‘Roger, let go of me and go to sleep,’ Brian grumbled insistently.

‘But I’m not tired!’ Roger threw back at him. When he placed his head against Brian’s back, Brian had really had enough of it, so he batted Roger’s hands away and turned around to face him – both of which did not make Roger let go of him, so Brian decided to lecture him instead.

‘Listen, Roger. It’s almost thirty degrees outside, I’m already practically naked, I’ve thrown all the blankets aside, covered the windows all day so that the sun couldn’t warm up the room, put on the fan, but _none_ of that is making this heat any more bearable, will you _please_ let go of me?’

‘No,’ Roger said insistently, like a toddler refusing to put on his coat when his parents told him to.

‘But I don’t want to get all warm and sweaty!’ Brian said, realising that if reasoning calmly did not work, he should probably get down to Roger’s current level of just whining to get what he wanted.

‘But I don’t want to be here alone!’ Roger said in the same sulky voice he had been using for the last couple of minutes, and Brian sighed. Roger knew how to play with his boyfriend’s emotions as he knew how to play the mixing panels in the studio; he always knew exactly which buttons to press to get the result he desired. Brian knew how lonely Roger would feel if he was lying in bed without any kind of contact in the form of cuddling, spooning, or at the very least holding hands, and Roger in turn knew how bad he could make Brian feel by telling him he felt like he was alone. Brian had always had a soft spot for his boyfriend’s need for physical contact, and now he was blind, it was nearly impossible to say no to him. Still, Brian knew Roger was just acting like this to get his way, and by adding that to the fact that it was still twenty-nine degrees both inside and outside of the room, Brian managed to stand up against him.

‘You know I’m right here, babe,’ he said as he gave Roger’s hand a short squeeze. ‘And you know that neither of us will be able to sleep if you’re hanging all over me.’

‘I’m not tired, Bri. And even if I would have been, I would’ve given up trying to sleep – it’s just too hot in here to sleep,’ Roger reasoned, already on his way to drape himself all over Brian, but Brian stopped him when his boyfriend’s words made him suddenly come up with a plan.

‘You’re right,’ Brian said as he propped himself up on his elbows. ‘It’s too hot to sleep here anyway. Come on, out of bed,’ he dictated and set the example by standing up from the mass of pillows and sheets, opening the door to let in some light from the hallway. Roger followed his example of sitting up straight, but seemed to be hesitant about the rest of Brian’s plan.

‘What? Where are you going?’ he asked as he reached out a helpless hand in his direction; the light of course did not help him see anything like it did for Brian.

‘To the bathroom. I know what will make you sleepy,’ Brian said as he took a step in the direction of the bed again, accepting Roger’s hand to help him off the bed. He realised that he was now giving in to Roger’s request of physical contact, but given that they were about to move away from the hotspot that was their bed at the moment, and given that he didn’t want to make a disoriented Roger tumble right off the bed, the guitarist decided that he was probably going to have to accept this as a necessary evil.

With this in his mind, Brian tugged Roger along with him to the opposite side of the hallway. Even though Roger, after having been blind for all this time, knew how to find his way around the house by now, he now clumsily stumbled behind Brian this time. Brian was unsure if this was because he was tired (even though he would never admit this after having claimed he wasn’t tired) or because Brian was in a hurry to make him tag along with him, or, a third option, because Roger was too busy wondering what the hell was happening to him to focus on where he was putting his feet.

‘How on earth is something in the bathroom going to make me sleepy?’ Roger asked while Brian opened the door that led to the room he wanted to guide Roger to.

‘We’re going to take a cold bath together,’ Brian announced, which seemed to spark excitement in Roger. At least, Brian assumed so when the drummer reached out his hands towards his general direction, a silent hint to help him sit down on the sink, which was Roger’s usual spot to sit on while Brian would get the bath ready. Brian placed his hands on either side of his waist and helped Roger lift himself up to sit on the marble top of the sink.

‘I’d like that,’ Roger told Brian once he had positioned himself on the sink securely, and Brian leant in to kiss his cheek.

‘I was hoping so,’ Brian told him, before he walked over to the bathtub. He reached over to open both the cold- and the warm water tap out of habit, but he soon realised that he might as well cut back on the warm water a bit to turn their tub into the actual cold bath that they both needed after having spent multiple hours sweating on the silk-like covers of their bed.

Brian felt the temperature of the water with his fingertips every now and then while the substance quietly filled the bathtub. It felt cold to his skin, but he reminded himself that that was exactly what he had been looking for for the past few days of this national heatwave, so he simply kept it upto the temperature it was at the moment, until the water was coming closer to the upper side of the bath. Brian figured it was time to switch the water off if he didn’t want it to spill over the edges the moment two grown men stepped into it – something Roger always found funny, but given that Brian knew for a fact that he was going to be the one to have to clean the mess up, the guitarist decided not to let it get to that point.

‘The bath is ready, Roger,’ Brian informed his boyfriend, who immediately jumped off the sink and walked over to the bathtub, discarding the last piece of clothing he had been wearing upto then on the way there. The drummer reached out a hand again, and Brian took it in his own, helping Roger safely climbing into the water. After the time Roger had slipped and ended up with a strained wrist, a bleeding lip, and a wound on his forehead from landing with his head on the marble edge of the bathtub, Brian had decided that it was better not to let him climb in- or out of the slippery tub himself anymore.

With Brian holding onto his hand, Roger reached one leg over the edge of the bathtub, and dipped his toes into the water.

‘It’s cold!’ he commented as he withdrew his foot, giving Brian a disapproving glance.

‘That was the plan, right? We’re boiling alive here!’ Brian reminded him, and Roger muttered something about exaggerating being Brian’s biggest talent, but he did pull through with it this time. He placed in one leg in the water first, before he added a second, and eventually let himself sink until he was sitting on the white marble surface of the bathtub, curling up against the side and wrapping his arms around his own body as to protect him from the cold water that surrounded him everywhere.

‘And? How does it feel?’ Brian asked somewhat rhetorically while he watched his boyfriend curling up in an attempt to warm himself up.

‘Cold,’ Roger said without thinking. ‘But it’s nice, though,’ he added with a bit of a smile as he moved his fingers through the cold water, and Brian smiled with along him.

‘That’s what I was needed to hear,’ Brian said, partly to his partner and partly to himself. His boxers soon joined Roger’s on the floor and he stepped into the bathtub at the opposite side. He had to admit that Roger was right about it being cold, but Lord, it was indeed very nice to finally get an opportunity to cool down from the hot weather. The water was cool and refreshing, and Brian couldn’t help rubbing the substance over his bare arms, splashing some of it into his face, and immersing as much of his body as he could.

‘This is so great,’ Brian sighed, having to oppress the tendency to open the tap and put his face underneath the streaming ice cold water; the only thing that kept him from doing so, was that it would probably scare Roger if he would suddenly turn the cold water into freezing cold water.

‘We should have done this way earlier,’ Roger agreed. He finally seemed to be feeling more comfortable in the cold bath to Brian; he had stopped trying to keep himself warm by wrapping his arms around his own torso, and instead was playing around with the water for a bit, rubbing it over his arms, and wetting his hair with it. Brian leaned back and looked with a small smile on his face at his boyfriend toying around in the water, but he was soon disturbed from his peaceful mood when Roger cleared his throat to speak.

‘Oh, and I was just thinking…’ Roger said, trailing one finger along the edge of the bathtub, ‘now that we’re not in a hot bedroom anymore, can I lie next to you again?’

Brian rolled his eyes when Roger asked him this question, but he knew that what he should actually do, was hit his own forehead – because, let’s be honest, it was stupid of him not to have seen ths coming. All Roger had been after that evening was lying close to each other, and the fact that they were currently not in bed but floating around in their bathtub, was not going to change anything about this.

‘Darling, I thought we were just starting to enjoy the cold water and all-’ Brian started, but it was already too late; Roger sat down on his knees and clumsily moved into his direction from this position, and Brian decided that all he could do to make the best out of the situation, was probably to put his arms below Roger’s armpits, safely dragging him over to his side and putting him down in his lap before his blind boyfriend would end up with a wound on his forehead again.

‘Sitting, then. You can’t lie next to me here, it’s too narrow,’ Brian told him, after which he was forced to watch the drummer crawl off his lap and nudge him towards the right side of the tub, so he could lie himself down next on his side.

‘You can never just take no for an answer, can you?’ Brian sighed.

‘Speaking of which…’ Roger said, and Brian felt two arms slipping tightly around his torso, just like Roger had done in bed earlier that night.

‘You are such a spoiled brat,’ Brian said.

‘I know,’ Roger said with a smile, and Brian sneakily splashed a handful of water into Roger’s face, causing Roger to yelp out of indignant surprise.

‘Brian! You know I can’t stand that!’ Roger whined as he said up straight, removing his arms from Brian’s body at last.

‘This is what you get when you insist on cuddling and lying down half on top of me! This is why I was warning you not to do that,’ Brian told him pedantically as he threw another amount of water at Roger, smiling at his boyfriend’s reaction to it in the form of helplessly splashing water in Brian’s general direction but without of course aiming for a specific body part. As a result, Brian scooped water back at his boyfriend, who tried to do the same to him, making the circle go round. After multiple rounds of throwing water back and forth, accompanied by Roger’s screams of surprise and ill-hidden enjoyment, Brian put a halt to the water fight when Roger’s randomly generated attempts to hit him had gotten bad enough to make ever-larger amounts of water spill out of the tub and onto the floor next to it.

‘Alright then, alright, that’s been enough of a waste of water for today,’ Brian announced, and he put his hand around Roger’s shoulder to pull him down into a lying position in the bath again. Miraculously, Roger obeyed instantly, and calmly lay down next to Brian, where he had been assigned by his lover. Brian soon found out why Roger was suddenly so willing to listen to him – it was because he had a serious question to ask him.

‘But you don’t really mind it, right? Cuddling and all?’ Roger suddenly said, and Brian looked down to find a pair of blue eyes insecurely glancing up at him. It always made Roger look so vulnerable when he would look at him with those big blue eyes that served no purpose other than making his boyfriend’s heart melt, Brian thought to himself – it made him appear so vulnerable, so adorable, so angelic. As if he could impossibly be the same person who had been driving Brian out of his mind by refusing to let go of him in the stuffy bedroom less than twenty minutes.

Despite all of this, Brian could impossibly tell him he minded cuddling – both because Roger looked at him so desperately, and because he actually truly adored being close to Roger, even if it had to be in this Godawful thirty degree heat.

‘Of course not. It’s just that I hate the hot weather, but of course I love cuddling with you. Especially in this cold water,’ Brian told him, putting this statement into practice by pulling Roger tighter towards him with the arm he had wrapped around his partner’s shoulder. Roger seemed comforted; he nestled his head against Brian’s shoulder, and Brian dragged a wet hand through Roger’s sweat-soaked tresses, as he would normally also do if they were lying in bed together.

‘I love cuddling with you too. That’s why I’m always up for it,’ Roger mumbled. Brian leant over to give him a kiss, and while doing so, he noticed that Roger had closed his eyes; his plan of getting him sleepy in here did seem to work right now. Brian smiled to himself – finally I’m getting my way, he said to himself as he continued stroking Roger’s hair, enjoying the calm of after a turbulent night of being kept awake by the heat, the noise of the ceiling fan, and – let’s be honest – by Roger clinging around him. Right now, however, everything was quiet and peaceful, and Brian closed his eyes as he enjoyed the sensation of cold water and his boyfriend lying against him to warm him up now that the water was starting to turn even colder than it already had been. In all this peacefulness, Brian closed his eyes for a moment; just for a moment, to fully appreciate the quietness he had been looking for all night – all day, to be completely honest. No matter how much he adored Roger, taking care of his blind boyfriend always took a lot of time and energy and patience – mainly that last component in the case of his stubborn partner – and a moment of rest was always much appreciated by Brian, who simply leant back against the edge of the bathtub and stared at the ceiling above him, calmly listening to his own heartbeat and the rhythm of Roger’s and his own breath.

Brian had no idea if it had been five minutes or half an hour when he looked up again, but what he did know was that the water had turned considerably colder in his mental absence, and that the weight of Roger’s body against his own was starting to get a bit uncomfortable by now.

‘Mmh… Rog? Are you still awake?’ Brian asked, moving to prop himself up on one elbow as much as possible on the slippery bathtub surface, but the only thing that he got to move was his own clumsy body on the slippery bathtub surface and the still water that surrounded him – Roger, on the other hand, was fast asleep and stayed exactly where he was while Brian moved to sit up.

‘Amazing. Who would have thought that after all I said, I would end up with Roger draped all over me against my wishes in this thirty degree heat, and yet manage to be _cold_ ,’ Brian muttered to no one specifically when he leant back again; there was, after all, no one around to hear him now that his partner had somehow managed to have fallen asleep right on top of his bony body in a pool of water that was starting to feel icy cold by now.

 _Well, I guess there’s only one thing I can do to warm myself up,_ Brian thought to himself, and he threw his arms around his boyfriend’s warm torso, hugging him as tightly as he possibly could in the cramped space of their stone cold bathtub.


	15. Fishing

‘Do we _really_ have to do this?’ Roger complained in that annoying nasal voice that sounded so bored and disinterested that it always made Brian want to roll his eyes and give his partner a poke against the ribs. However, he judged that right now was not the best moment to do this; not now that they were ploughing through the uneven surfaces of long-deserted meadows of which the grass and weeds and other sorts of random vegetation hadn’t been cut in what seemed like ages, carrying multiple bags with equipment in their hands, in their quest to find a decent spot to sit down at. Or that was, _his_ quest - because if it had been Roger’s, they would have been making their way straight back to the car again. Never would have left the car or even the house in the first place, probably.

‘You said I could choose what we’re going to do today,’ Brian reminded Roger in an attempt to silence him, even though he knew it was going take more than simply saying it was his turn to pick an afternoon activity to make Roger give in to what he obviously thought was dreadfully boring.

‘But that wasn’t supposed to be a free pass for you to pick something boring!’ Roger said.

‘Fishing isn’t boring!’ Brian threw back at him, before he grabbed Roger’s lower arm in a reflex when he saw a chunk of mud dooming up between the high grass in front of Roger. ‘Look out, there’s something in the way,’ he warned while simultaneously pulling Roger towards his side of the ‘road’,  or whatever one wanted to call the trail of grass that was slightly flatter than the surrounding weeds as a result of a handful of people who had probably walked the same route lately. Roger murmured something about being able to walk on his own, but they both knew that this was not entirely true; not when they were following such an uneven path as this one, where his walking cane was no help to him whatsoever in guarding him from possible dangers popping up on the ground below him.

Brian was therefore determined to help his partner find his way whether he liked it or not. On top of that, the guitarist secretly hoped that his action and words about the obstacle would serve as a distraction from the debate concerning whether fishing was boring or not. But unfortunately for him, Roger had not forgotten about the topic just yet.

‘It is! You just sit next to the water and wait for a shrimp to pass by until the end of times!’ Roger effortlessly continued, as if he had never almost tripped over a chunk of dried mud lying in front of him less than two seconds ago. Brian knew he shouldn’t get too deep into this exaggerated comment to point out on which levels what Roger had just said was unrealistic, but his enthusiasm about nature and biology - or, as Roger would call it, his nerdy side - got the better of him.

‘First of all, there are no shrimps to be found in the average ditch in South England. No living ones anyway,’ he corrected himself quickly; however, the sigh Roger emitted prevented him from continuing to talk about how shrimps once had been swimming around in places like these, but how they had gradually disappeared from fresh water dishes as a result of a change in climate and environment that had taken place over the last couple of centuries in England. ‘And secondly, it’ll only take a couple of hours,’ Brian said in an attempt to make Roger give in, even though he should have known that, considering Roger’s average attention span and level of patience for matters he was not interested in, this would only make the whole situation sound worse for his boyfriend.

‘That’s what I’m saying, forever!’ Roger mewled in disapproval.

Brian allowed himself to sigh at this comment of his boyfriend that once again proved that Roger had never had and probably also never would acquire any patience for any activity he was not interested in himself. Of course, he could spend hours listening to music (or previously, looking at cars and hang in front of the TV) - but the mere thought of spending an afternoon on fishing had been enough cause for him to complain all morning about the proposal, and to carry this state of enthusiasm into the actual activity itself as well.

‘Babe, be happy I managed to convince my father not to come with us when we went to pick up the fishing rods and all. If he would have been with us, you would have been stuck here until dinnertime,’ Brian told him, which at last seemed to make Roger shut up for a moment. When Brian had made clear to him that morning that they were going fishing - and he fruitlessly had made clear to him that he hated the idea of that - they had gone over to Brian’s parents to gather all items one needed to go fishing. This, however, had taken longer than either of them would have wanted for it to do, as Harold had prevented them from leaving by continually talking about his favourite hobby and had been presenting alternative fishing rods, hooks and bait. In fact, his sermons on the difference of hooks with and without barbs in the light of the possibility of extraction of the fish once it had been caught, had lasted so long that Roger had quietly slipped away to drink tea with Ruth instead, leaving Brian to try and put an end to his father’s monologue - after all, going fishing had been his idea. In the end, Brian had managed to get rid of both his father’s knowledge on the topic and had managed to escape from his parents’ place before two hours had passed on the clock since the moment they had entered the house.

In any case, the reminder that Harold could have been going fishing _with_ them if it hadn’t been for Brian and his mother having convinced him to stay home to work in the garden instead, at last seemed to be an argument from Brian’s side that was compelling enough to stop Roger from whining about going fishing as a general topic. However, Roger would not have been Roger if he hadn’t resorted to something else to complain about instead.

‘Are we almost there?’ he asked in a voice even the deaf could hear was more than just a little whiny - but luckily for Brian, he had an answer to this question that would silence his partner instantly.

‘I think that where we are right now is just about right,’ Brian said as he stood still in the middle of the meadow, peering over the even looking surface below them and the muddy but /alive/ looking water that stretched out in front of them. ‘We’re just going to have to walk a few metres towards the left to sit close to the ditch…’ Brian instructed his partner, but not without grasping whose upper arm in a gentle yet firm grip to help him navigate his way to the exact location he had been planning for the two of them to sit down at - and more than that, to prevent him from walking too far towards the desired direction and landing up in the ditch instead of in front of it. After having experienced multiple accidents involving Roger falling into water, both out in nature and right in the middle of a very low-walled fountain in the city, Brian found himself feeling more at ease when holding onto his partner whenever open water popped up anywhere in their direct vicinity.

Once he had safely directed Roger to a spot approximately two metres away from the water (which Brian assumed was going to be a pretty safe distance even for his playful, curious, and most of all overly clumsy boyfriend), the guitarist untied the strips of his backpack, the sound of which seemed to be all Roger needed to do the same to the one he had been ordered to carry with him. While Roger simply threw it down in the grass without seeming to be minding the contents of it on any level, Brian unzipped his own bag, pulled an old white and red checker picnic cloth out of it, and began spreading it out over the grassy surface below.

‘So, I’ve just put the cloth down for us to sit on-‘ Brian said, but before he even got the chance to add to this remark that the edges of it still needed to be straightened out and that he still needed to check if there were no stones or other irregularities lying underneath their picnic cloth, Roger had already dived down onto the plaid, leaving Brian to wonder why he even _bothered_. Then again, he had not heard Roger yelp in pain as a result of landing right on top of a stone or whatever else might be hidden below their picnic cloth, and he did not complain anymore now that he had been allowed to finally sit down after their twenty minute walk, so Brian just let go of his intentions to straighten out the picnic cloth and simply crouched down next to his partner.

‘I see you’re already making yourself comfortable here,’ Brian laughed when he saw Roger, who had already flopped over to his front, having resorted to unzipping the backpack he had been carrying in his quest for what Brian assumed could be nothing else than the food he had put into it before they had left their place that morning.

‘If only this bag would… cooperate…’ Roger mumbled through gritted teeth while using one and to undo the rest of the zipper and pushing his other arm into the bag to search through its contents - and, in Brian’s humble opinion, ruin the logistical plan he had set u to make sure everything fitted into the space of the backpack perfectly. Therefore, he was quick to gently yet firmly release the bag from his partner’s impatient hands, fully unzip it, and fish out the item he had been looking for.

‘Here, go have some of these while I set everything up,’ Brian instructed his partner, who clumsily yet eagerly stretched out his arms to take the roll of biscuits from Brian, after which he lied down on the tablecloth again to devour a handful of the cookies and, more importantly, left his boyfriend to set everything up and figure everything out the way he wanted without interruptions.

Brian took his time taking everything out of the bag and arranging all the items on the cloth in front of him; the fishing rods, the box containing all the bait and barbs and whatever more one could need for amateur fishery, a book containing pictures and description of all fish one could possibly catch in the lakes and ditches across Western Europe, and lastly, the emmer they had taken with them in case they would catch some serious catch. When everything had been sorted out, he unfolded their fishing rods, fastened a hook and bait he found to be fitting for the size of fish they were planning on catching, and filled the emmer with a splash of water from the ditch he was sitting next to. When all of this had been said and done - and when Roger seemed to be on his way to his sixth biscuit at the very least, Brian decided to call out to him and invite him to join him - or, if necessary, force him to join him. Luckily for the both of them, it seemed that there was no need for forcing or threatening in the first place.

‘Roger, we’re ready to start. Are you coming?’

Brian ignored the sigh he was rather positive he could hear his boyfriend emitting, and instead focussed on the positive side of the situation - which was that Roger, be it after sneaking one more biscuit out of the package, put the roll of cookies aside and somewhat begrudgingly crawled closer to the place where Brian was sitting.

‘Coming,’ he mumbled little enthusiastically, but Brian decided not to get into that too deeply - Roger was listening to him, after all, which was more than he could have anticipated beforehand.

‘Could you please like… shuffle over here, instead of crawling? I’m afraid you’ll end up falling in the water this way,’ Brian uttered his concerns with a bit of a frown forming between his brows when he observed Roger’s way of getting over to him.

‘Would that be a reason for us to go home?’ Roger asked with a sparkle of excitement, as if he was proud of himself that he had found a way out of the situation he found himself stuck in. Unfortunately for him, however, Brian was not planning on letting him escape from their afternoon off that easily.

‘I took some spare clothes with me, just in case you and your two left hands would end up falling into the ditch or something the like,’ Brian informed him in a somewhat belittling voice, as if he was low-key reproving Roger for the carelessness that had landed him into unfortunate situations a million times before.

‘I’m not _that_ clumsy!’ Roger protested indignantly in reply to his partner’s tone.

‘Need I remind you of that time you tripped and fell into a city fountain? Or that time when you-‘

‘Alright, I got the message,’ Roger interrupted him not so much out of indignance, but out of a realisation that his partner did not have to fire more examples of unfortunate events at him - he had proven his clumsiness already by enumerating just these ones. He simultaneously propped himself up on his elbows and shuffled closer to Brian until he was eventually sitting next to him on the edge of the cloth, as close to the water as Brian would allow him.

‘Alright then, so you’re sitting _and_ staying here,’ Brian told Roger, probably already foreseeing his partner’s tendencies to always sneak away and put himself into dangerous situations whenever he looked away from him for approximately two seconds. ‘And here is your fishing rod…’ Brian told him as he pressed the thin, metal bar into Roger’s hands before he could object against it. ‘Here is the reel; you spin this when you feel like you’ve got something,’ Brian continued to explain while guiding Roger’s fingers to the small device towards the end of the angling rod. ‘So now I’ll cast your barb and float into the water, and then it’s all a matter of patience.’

‘Which definitely is one of my main virtues,’ Roger grumbled while his partner threw the line into the ditch, waiting until the barb had sunken below the water and the float was lying on the surface of it.

‘Then I guess this is gonna be a great exercise for you,’ Brian said when he cast his own fishing line into the water next to the spot where Roger’s was floating around. He installed himself next to his lover, picked up the book on the aquatic fauna of Western Europe that he had taken with him, and started flicking through it while enjoying the peace and quiet of the environment he was surrounded by - that was, until one particular aspect of this environment decided to break the silence.

‘Is something happening yet?’ Roger asked, and Brian looked up from his book to face his watch instead, on which he found that it had hardly been more than two minutes since he had prepared Roger’s angle and tossed it into the water that stretched out in front of them.

‘You’ll feel it when you’ve got a fish,’ Brian told him as he picked up the book he had laid aside again, flicking through the pages in his quest for the spot where he had left off a moment before.

‘I don’t feel anything yet,’ Roger commented with a touch of whininess in his voice, as if he demanded an explanation for the fact that no fish had latched on yet during the past two minutes.

‘It can take a while,’ Brian answered without looking up from his book this time.

‘How long is a while?’ Roger asked, reminding Brian of a toddler who had been told his birthday was going to be in two weeks but who had yet to receive the notion and duration of the concept of time and until then kept asking his parents when the two weeks were going to pass.

‘Depends. If you’re lucky two minutes, if you’re out of luck it might take an hour.’

‘An hour?!’ Roger exclaimed, apparently not having expected to have to wait this long for an activity he had reluctantly agreed to.

‘Or it might not happen at all. Shouting is not going to work in any case; all that will do is scare off the fish,’ Brian reproved Roger, whose sigh sounded more like a grumble when Brian thought about it.

‘But what am I supposed to _do_ while those nasty fish swim right by for an hour?’ Roger asked with a touch of hopelessness in his voice that betrayed just how terribly impatient he could be when he was not actively being entertained for a while.

‘Just sit here, lie back, enjoy the beautiful nature out here...’ Brian proposed, but Roger did not seem to be in the mood for any of those options.

‘What nature? For all I know we could be sitting in the middle of an industrial park here.’

‘A silent industrial park with meadows and ditches in suburban London. That surely sounds realistic,’ Brian recapped with a bit of a snicker, pulling the fishing line a bit tighter by spinning the reel. However, as he understood that his partner really had no idea how to amuse himself in the absence of radio or TV or braille books, Brian reached over to pick up the roll of biscuits again and handed it back to the previous owner of them. ‘Then take another biscuit, or try to come up with a new drum beat, lyrics, something to do in the bedroom tonight… Just as long as you’re quiet.’

‘You’re not going to get laid tonight after having dragged me into this, to have you know,’ Roger snorted, but he did take the roll of biscuits from Brian’s hands, relieving Brian with the idea that he would at least be quiet if he would be munching on a biscuit. However, before this thought had even had the time to settle in his mind, Brian already found out that he had been wrong about this assumption; his boyfriend seemed to have chosen to make a show out of biting chunks off his biscuit and chewing them between his teeth with as much noise as he could possible produce, while simultaneously, to make things worse, squeezing the plastic packaging material between his fingers to create a crackling sound. Brian had to press his lips together to prevent himself from saying something about it; but knowing that attention was exactly what Roger wanted, he managed to refrain from it and instead focussing on the float drifting around on the surface of the water. After all, as far as he was concerned, the fish couldn't hear the sound of rattling plastic through the water anyway.

Roger eventually stopped fiddling around with the plastic package when he found that Brian wasn't giving him attention for it anyway, and instead quietly focused on the water before him, staring into the dark substance for minutes at last. Through the whole process of it, his fingers were still resting on the reel of his angle, and before too long he eventually felt a tug at the fishing line that indicated that at last he had perhaps caught something.

 ‘I think I’ve got something!’ Roger said in a more enthusiastic voice than Brian ever could have imagined him to pull off during an activity like this. When Roger jumped up from the ground, Brian was quick to follow his example, feeling almost as excited as his partner about his potential catch, If not more he after all was the one who had chosen the activity.

‘What do I do now?’ Roger asked as, seeming to be at a loss for other actions or words. He had obviously not anticipated that he would actually end up catching something substantial in this muddy ditch in Southern England, and now needed his partner to tell him what to do.

‘Just spin the reel as fast as you can, before your catch escapes,’ Brian instructed, so Roger did just this; he moved the handle of the reel around as fast as he could to lift his catch up from the water before it would be given the chance to escape, as Brian had warned him for a moment ago.

However, once he had angled up his catch, it turned out that there had been no need to hurry; there was no way his haul was going to escape from him. Nor was it in any aspect ‘something substantial’ that Roger had hoped for;  in all honesty it wasn't even a living organism, or not anymore in any case, now that it had been detached from its roots somewhere deep down below the water.

‘Congrats, darling, you’ve caught a weed!’ Brian laughed as he fished the nylon fishing line with Roger’s first haul out of the air. Even though he knew that Roger could not care less about a fishery as a whole, Brian was sure he had not seen a look as disappointed on his partners face as the one he was currently flashing him in a long time.

‘Oh, sure, a piece of weed,’ Roger sighed. ‘And I’m assuming that it’s not going to be the kind of weed one would need to spice up something boring like this whole fishing thing.’’

‘You seemed pretty excited when you caught something, though,’ Brian could not help reminding his boyfriend, who by now had to resort to flashing him a dirty look. He obviously did not want to be reminded of the enthusiasm he had momentarily shared with Brian when it had seemed that he was succeeding at this afternoon’s activity that he hated with a burning passion now even more than before the weed-catching incident.

‘That was before I knew I had caught a piece of grass,’ Roger grumbled, clearly having a hard time coping with the fact that his only catch after more than half an hour of waiting, turned out to be a dying piece of grass that had been floating around in the water.

‘Just admit that you felt the excitement of that moment when you feel something tugging at your fishing rod, when you carefully had to wait until you were sure it had bitten onto the bait, and when you spun that wheel around to discover what it was going to be-‘

‘Brian, one more word and I’ll scream and hopefully disturb all of the three remaining fish in this Godforsaken ditch to the point where they’ll not return for the entire day,’ Roger warned him.

‘Why, there’s no need to be this grumpy,’ Brian said, only barely managing to stifle a giggle at Roger’s colourful use of imaginary. ‘Let’s try again, maybe you’ll have better luck next time,’ Brian said as he threw the piece of weed back into the ditch, positioned the barb and the float back to its place in the water where it had been before, and convinced Roger to sit down and wait until they would perhaps have more luck a second time around.

At first, it seemed like they were out of luck. Minutes and minutes went by quietly without either of them feeling even as less as a single tug at the fishing line  seeing a single star in the water before them,  or any other indication of sea life beneath the surface of the water of the ditch that they were sitting in front of to wait and see what would happen. Unfortunately, it seemed like nothing was happening, and they ended up sitting and staring at the muddy water for what felt to be an hour, not even just to the judgement of Roger, but also to that of Brian, who was usually a much more patient personality than the boy he had dragged along with him that afternoon - a side of himself which Roger felt like showing off every other minute.

‘Is something happening yet?’ Roger asked for what must have been the thirtieth time in less than half an hour. Brian didn’t even look up from the book he had flicked through thrice by now anymore while answering him.

‘No, babe, nothing’s happening.’

Silence for all but thirty seconds, before Roger repeated his question: ‘And what about now?’

‘You literally asked me half a minute ago,’ Brian reminded him, not exactly getting some of the quiet time to read and look around their environment like he had been hoping for when he had planned this afternoon off. Then again, he knew he should have known better than thinking he would get any piece of mind with Roger at his side. In an attempt to at least not be driven out of his mind by his partner’s endless questioning, he proposed: ‘I’ll tell you when something’s going on, alight?’, to which Roger silently agreed by rolling over and stuffing another biscuit into his mouth.

They went without a sign of fish or other sea life for so long that even Brian began to feel like he had picked the wrong activity for their day off, even though there was of course no way he was going to admit that to his partner,  who have been finding the whole fishery utterly boring and nonsensical right from the start of the day.

Then, just as Brian was about to break the awkward growing silence between his partner and him now that nothing was happening in their direct surroundings, he suddenly noticed a faint pull at the end of the fishing line, distracting him from the words he had been planning to utter to Roger and turn to his fishing line instead.

Not wanting to create excitement over nothing, as had been a case the last time they have thought they had been lucky but instead ended up with a piece of grass, Brian this time silently stood up from his place on the ground. He took his fishing angle with him and intensely studied the slightly troubled surface of the water that by now displayed a faint movement going on just below the surface, and he found himself hoping and praying that at last he would have caught something - not so much because it was his absolute goal to pull a fish out of the water today, but just to prove to his sceptical partner that there were, indeed, fish swimming around in the average ditches and lakes of Southern England, as he has told him all along.

Speaking of who… Brian’s movement of getting up from the ground seem to have caught the attention of Roger, who was still positioned on the cloth where he had been lying on his belly to play with the grass and munch away the few remaining biscuits over the course of the last hour out of pure boredom. Now, however, he propped himself up on his elbows, stood up, and placed a hand on Brian’s upper arm, which was where he found out by the tension of his boyfriend’s muscles that something was  about to go down.

‘Do you think you have something this time?’ Roger whispered, proving that he could after all speak quietly if he wanted to.

Brian nodded in an attempt to indeed keep their volume down and not scare away their potential bait, but shifted to a spoken answer when he remembered that his boyfriend would not be able to see his nodding. ‘I do, and I believe that it might actually be a fish this time,’ Brian said as a throwback to their previous and fortunate catch of a mere piece of weed. ‘Just gotta wait for the float…’ Without finishing his sentence, Brian resumed his fishing activity, impatiently waiting for the float to sink below the surface of the water, which would indicate that a fish really had bitten into the bait, and that it was time for him to take in his haul. He fell awfully quiet and motionless for a moment, behaviour which even the otherwise jumpy Roger copied from him for the occasion, until the float diving below the surface of the water gave Brian the sign he had been waiting for.

‘Got it!’ he exclaimed while he pulled the float and barb out of the water in one quick and sudden pull that gave Roger, who had attached himself to his arm a moment ago, quite a start. Brian was quick to apologise and move on to spin and wind up the reel as to take in his haul. There were no hard feelings from Roger’s side either; the boy seemed all too relieved about all their efforts and patience finally turning into a tangible result to be angry about almost having been made to trip over by a sudden and unexpected movement from his partner.

‘What is it? Is it an actual fish this time?’ he asked with a touch of nervousness in his voice, obviously excited but not wanting to celebrate their catch before he had been assured that it actually was a decent fish of some sort - or not a piece of weed, in any case.

‘It’s an actual fish!’ Brian smiled as he looked at the small, greyish fish that dangled in front of him now that he had fully rolled up the fishing line. He leant over to pick up the bucket filled with water with one hand, after which he laid down the fishing angle, carefully released the fish from the barb it had been hooked on, and put the slippery, writhing animal into the water before it could escape from his hands.

‘Where is it? And where are you?’ Roger asked him, having noticed that Brian had crouched down and moved away from him to take care of the fish, but having no idea what he was doing right now.

‘Right next to you on the ground. Here, take my hand,’ Brian offered while stretching out his hand for Roger to pick up, which the drummer gladly did before he settled down next to Brian. He then shook his hand apart from Brian’s grip and used it to figure out the location of the bucket with their treasured fish in it instead.

‘Look, here you go,’ Brian said when he picked up Roger’s hand and placed it on the edge of the bucket in which the fish was darting around.

‘Can I feel?’ Roger asked him, and Brian, though taken aback a bit by this unexpected request (given that Roger had not seemed to be caring the least about fish five minutes ago), consented.

‘Sure,’ Brian told him, guiding Roger’s hands into the water, where his fingertips soon came in touch with the slippery, wet scales of the animal they had managed to angle out of its habitat. At first he seemed to freeze at the touch of it, but soon a bit of a smile appeared around his lips.

‘Feels weird,’ Roger admitted as he carefully moved his finger along the scales of the fish, which by now had resorted to remaining in the same corner of the bucket as if to escape from the hands trying to touch their skin. ‘What kind of fish is it?’

‘It looks like a common roach to me,’ Brian told him. ‘Not very extraordinary, but after having caught nothing put a piece of weed after one and a half hour, it’s good enough for me.’

‘You can say that again,’ Roger muttered, clearly still displeased with the fact that his only catch so far had not even been an animal - and even more displeased with the fact that Brian wanted to discard of the only fish they had managed to get a hold of that day right after they had caught it.

‘Come, let’s put it back into the water,’ Brian proposed as he lifted up the bucket by its metal handle, but Roger was not removing his hands from the water at this announcement; instead, he kept them right where they were, and stared at Brian hazily.

‘Wait, put it back? Aren’t we going to take it home and… I don’t know, eat it?’ he asked in confusion.

‘East it?’ Brian asked in a same state of confusion. ‘Darling, it’s a common roach, not even full grown yet. We might as well eat a goldfish.’

Slowly starting to understand that they had not been going out fishing for any practical purpose, Roger indignantly asked Brian: ‘So if we’re not going to take the fish we catch home, then what are we doing this for?’

‘Because it’s fun, that’s why!’ Brian said with a smile, but the look he received in return from his partner was quite the opposite; it was one of Roger’s infamous half-terrifying yet half-adorable looks he would flash at people when he really wanted them to shut their mouth at the earliest convenience. ‘Oh, if looks could kill…’ Brian said while leaping forwards to give his partner’s cheek a pinch, something that only seemed to make matters worse. Therefore, in an attempt to keep Roger’s annoyance from escalating further than it already had, Brian suggested: ‘But if you want to eat fish tonight, we can buy some at that place near the centre.’

‘You know what? I don’t even _want_ to eat fish anymore. I’ve seen enough fish for the rest of my life,’ Roger said in the same half-indignant, half-whiny voice Brian had been hearing a lot over the course of the last handful of hours.

‘You kept complaining about not catching any fish for hours, and now you say you’ve seen enough fish for the rest of your life?’ Brian threw back at him, even though he knew that this was probably not the best time to start doing this. Luckily for him, Roger was not in too much of a defensive mood at the moment - or maybe he was, but preferred to use Brian’s words against him instead of arguing about whether or not he had wanted to take a specimen of a common roach home from this Godawful fishing experience.

‘I wasn’t being literal. Because literally speaking, I haven’t seen any fish today, or anywhere over the course of the last year, mind you,’ Roger told him with the slightest of a smile.

‘Smartass,’ Brian said with an eyeroll. ‘Well, say goodbye to our fish, it’s time to go home.’

‘Really?’ Roger asked in a surprise and relief that bordered on pure happiness, showing Brian that it really, really was time to take him away from this place that he hated so much and the activity that he loathed even more. ‘Is it finally happening?’

‘Well, back to my parents’ house, that is. We need to bring the fishing equipment back. And let me warn you in advance – that might take even longer than the fishing itself, because my father will want to know everything,’ Brian said, this time even sighing himself at the prospect of this.

‘Ugh… But there’s nothing to be told! We caught a piece of weed and one common roach that you want to throw back in the water,’ Roger whined. ‘Can I stay in the car?’

‘No, you can’t, my parents will want to see you!’ Brian told him. ‘And my mother probably made us cake and tea and all while we were out,’ he added, which always managed to change Roger’s mind - even now that he had eaten more than half of a package of biscuits, apparently.

‘In which case, I might consider coming with you,’ Roger said as he stood up from the picnic cloth, wiping his wet hands dry on the fabric of his jeans.

‘I knew that would change your mind,’ Brian said with a smile, before he turned back to the topic of the fish that Roger obviously did not want to let go of. ‘Maybe we should take the common roach with us, after all. Perhaps we could add it up to the cake to make a savoury cake out of it…’

This seemed to instantly change Roger’s mind about the topic of whether they should take the fish with them or dump it back into the ditch it came from again. ‘ _Please_ , throw that fish back into the water before I’ll push you into it along with the fish,’ Roger said resolutely, making Brian snort indignantly at the choice between throwing the fish into the water or being throwing into it himself that Roger was offering him.

‘Pushing _me_ into it?’ Brian repeated him in disbelief. ‘After having put up with all your nagging all day long, I think you should be the one being pushed into the ditch! Get over here!’

‘No!’ Roger squealed in a voice high and loud enough to make Brian believe that it would effectively scare away the remainder of the aquatic population of the water in front of them. However, while it might make the fish flee as soon as they could, it did not manage to prevent Brian from getting at him; in fact, before he could even do as much as stepping more than two steps back, Brian had already thrown one arm around his back and the other one around the back of his knees, after which he effectively pulled Roger off the ground. By the time he did this, Roger squealed loudly enough to make Brian believe that all of the sea life population of the ditch had vanished; something that only got worse when Brian took a few steps closer to the ditch, not quite nearing it but managing to give Roger the idea that he was only one step away from being tossed into the cloudy water.

‘Brian, let go of me!’ Roger whined, ‘Let me go, now!’

‘Right now? You’ll be lying right in the middle of the ditch, but if that’s how you like it…’ Brian said, making a show out of loosening his grip on him and bending forwards to the water. When Roger clamped his hands around the back of Brian’s neck and emitted a few more pitiful howls, Brian decided that he had taught him enough of a lesson this time, and carefully placed Roger back on his feet on the picnic cloth.

‘What was that good for?!’ Roger asked once he had been let go of, flashing Brian a dirty look.

‘Relieving my frustration with you not cooperating today,’ Brian answered, but he soon after pressed a kiss on Roger’s cheek to let him know that he was only joking. The last thing he wanted was for Roger to believe that he was angry at him, which he was not at all; he had been fully aware of Roger’s impatience when stepping into this activity, and at the end of the day, he had shown himself to be capable of behaving if he had to, which was all Brian could ask for.

‘In which case… I think I have to toss someone into the water to relieve my frustration as well,’ Roger grumbled in response to Brian’s statement. Just when Brian was afraid he was soon going to have to try and squeeze himself into the spare pair of trousers he had taken with him in case Roger would end up getting wet, Roger crouched down on the cloth below them, fumbled for the bucket, and once he found it, picked it up and held it above the water.

‘There we go. To relieve my frustration of you and your stupid fellow fish never biting onto my bait today,’ Roger said as he held the bucket upside down, emptying its contents - both the water and the fish - into the ditch.

‘Well, then that’s settled,’ Brian said with a smile towards Roger’s act of discarding their catch, before he took the now empty bucket from Roger’s hands. ‘Come on, let’s pack up our stuff, go home, and hope that the whole fishing activity didn’t inspire my mother to bake us a savoury cake,’ he chucked, before the both of them packed up their equipment in order to head back home again.


	16. The Fracture

_Well,_ Brian sighed tiredly while staring at the fingers of the radiologic nurse that fastened the tips of the rectangular piece of white cloth behind the back of Roger’s neck with a security pin _, it had to happen sometimes. It seemed to have been hanging in the air for too long already; it had been nothing but a stay of execution until this would finally happen one day._

Brian gave his boyfriend a bit of a compassionate yet encouraging smile when the younger boy looked in his direction, forever forgetting that this would be useless in Roger’s situation, since he couldn’t see the gesture he was pulling off towards him anyway. What he actually should be doing was giving his cheek a bit of a squeeze, or better, pull him against his torso and give him a hug, but he decided against this plan for two reasons - the first of which being that Roger was sitting about two metres away from him on the treatment table where the nurse readjusted the fabric she had just pinned together, and secondly, because it did not seem like a good idea to touch Roger after his boyfriend had just hurt himself badly enough to end up at the first aid section of the hospital.

‘Alright then, that was all. You can stand up again,’ the doctor standing beside the nurse told Roger, and Brian held his breath when his boyfriend - now not only physically impaired by his blindness but also by having one arm wrapped up in plaster below the sling that detracted his broken arm from sight - supported himself on his remaining hand and jumped off the table-like surface he had been sitting on. Luckily, he neatly landed on two feet next to the treatment table, making Brian sign in relief that his boyfriend did not break another ankle while doing so.

On the other hand, if his incredibly clumsy boyfriend was to have to undergo an ankle fracture as well, then maybe this would be the right moment - they were already in the hospital anyway, and the painkillers he had been administered about an hour ago, were probably still functioning.

‘As I said before, a double fracture in the lower area of the radius,’ the doctor told them while pointing at the fracture displayed in life-size on the black board behind them, and Brian stood up from the chair he had been assigned to sit in when he had gotten in the way of the radiologist too often by hugging Roger while they were trying to take X-rays and apply the plaster around his arm. Brian was of course the only one to see the picture the man pointed at; he watched and listened carefully to the explanation of the doctor while at the same time keeping an eye on Roger, who, though still standing next to him, seemed to be planning to make his getaway. ‘We’ve cleaned the area from blood, placed the fractured bones against each other, and plastered up the arm to let the bone heal on its own.’ Just the reminder of the blood and the sight of the fractured bones below the unnatural curve of Roger’s arm less than two hours ago made Brian shiver, a feeling that only got worse when the doctor added that Roger had been lucky he had not fractured his cubit, which would have needed an iron pin through it to make it heal properly and reduce the risk of growing together the wrong way, as to say so.

‘How long will it take to heal?’ Brian asked, slipping an arm around his boyfriend’s waist and pulling him towards him to stop him from darting through the room and possibly creating a repeat performance by tripping over his own feet or something the like.

‘Six weeks should be enough. This is the standard amount of time any plastered fracture is given to heal before we take off the case to check on the development of the healing bones. Normally the bones have fully recovered after six weeks, but if anything turns out to not be right by then, we will immediately take measures to fix this as soon as possible.’

 _If it’s not too late already by then,_ Brian found himself thinking dimly, but he quickly shook his head as to remove the thought from his mind; there was nothing to worry about, there was not going to be anything causing complications in the process of healing, there was nothing wrong apart from his boyfriend having broken his right lower arm like Brian had expected him to do at some point in time. It might have sounded cruel to think about his partner like that, but Brian couldn’t help it; he had always known how lively and bubbly and yet clumsy his partner was, and adding this up to his newly acquired blindness, an accident that stretched further than simply burning his fingertips on the iron stove or waking into the kitchen cabinet had seemed to be inevitable. And to prove Brian’s expectations about Roger being clumsy was the cause of his partner’s broken arm - it had not been a fall from the stairs, from the hammock, or the swing in the garden. He hadn’t tripped over the many tables and wires randomly lying around on the floor of their studio, or at least over the treacherously high threshold between the kitchen and their garden, but over Sandy’s dog basket, the soft pillow that had been lying at the exact place next to the door of the living room since the day they had gotten Roger’s guide dog, for the love of the Lord.

‘Do you have any questions concerning how to take care of the fractured bones, how to treat the plaster case, what Roger can do and what he should avoid doing for the upcoming weeks?’ the doctor asked, pulling Brian back from the topic of how on earth Roger had missed Sandy’s pillow, and even more than that, how the lightweight item had made him trip over and break his arm, to the topic of question concerning how to deal with said broken arm.

Brian discovered that he had some questions that had been wandering through his mind, but he figured that it was about time they were going; Roger did not only seem to have no questions to ask the medical experts, he also seemed to be getting bored with sitting and standing around in the first aid room for what must have been about two hours by now. Brian figured that he could probably find the answer to most questions concerning ‘how to shower with a plaster case’ and ‘is it harmful to sleep on the side of your broken arm’ (given that Roger usually preferred sleeping on his right side) in the informational leaflet with the rather straightforward title ‘FRACTURES AND PLASTER CASES: THE DOS AND DONTS’ he had been given by the nurse upon their arrival as to make sure he would not miss out on this apparently indispensable information. Besides that, Brian figured that he could just call his mother if he had any questions concerning Roger’s new temporary handicap - she seemed to have known exactly what to when he had fractured his arm as a child in primary school. She would probably be in tears and demand to come over and help him take care of Roger if she heard about her son-in-law’s latest misfortunate act, which was totally fine with Brian; he could did not always appreciate his mother’s well-intended but somewhat intrusive way of ‘offering’ her help to them, but at the moment, he could probably use his mother for an afternoon to help him look after his partner now that he had just crushed his lower arm in an unfortunate fall.

Today her help wasn’t going to be necessary, though; after having arrived at the hospital and having to wait for a moment between Roger getting his first check-up on what was wrong with him (although it had been pretty clear that it had been a broken arm to anyone with either functioning eyes or feeling the pain of it themselves, in Roger’s scenario), Brian had found a telephone attached to the wall in the hallway which he had used to call Freddie and John to come over. By the time their friends had arrived, the two of them had already been called into the treatment room, but Brian knew that they were waiting on them in the hallway of the first aid section of the hospital not just by them having promised to come over as soon as possible, but also by Freddie’s upset sounding voice and John’s attempts to calm him down with - which made Brian snicker involuntarily - the reminder that they knew this was going to happen sooner or later.

With the realisation of both Roger wanting to get out of this room and their friends waiting on them outside, Brian politely told the doctor and nurse they did not have any questions. They promised to call if the pain returned, and they were send outside with the instruction to make a new appointment to come over in six weeks again at the front desk of the first aid.

Brian politely greeted the doctors - on his own behalf and on that of Roger, who seemed too happy to finally be released from the room where he had been put through even more pain setting his bone than the action of breaking it on its own had caused him to say a decent goodbye - and opened the door for the two of them. He watched carefully to make sure Roger wouldn’t trip over the threshold of the room while leaving it, after which he followed his partner and closed the door behind them.

‘Well, that was quite the experience,’ Brian sighed, relieved they could finally leave the first aid room behind them. He felt fingers poking against his hip, and turned around to see Roger sticking his hand out towards him. From experience he could tell that he did this because he wanted to hold hands, which, Brian decided, was not just something that was probably a safe plan to do after just having broken his arm, but which the both of them also needed after having been forced to ‘play it cool’ for the past hours. Public display of affection was not generally accepted behind the doors of a professional environment like this, which had caused them to have to stick to pats on the back and an occasional hug whenever possible or allowed. But despite still being in the hospital, Brian decided that this moment (now that no other patients or medical staff was to be found in the hallway surrounding them) was the perfect opportunity for them to do a little more than just holding hands.

Slipping both his arms around Roger’s waist and carefully pulling him against his torso, Brian nuzzled at Roger’s hair while telling him: ‘You’ve been very brave in there, darling.’

‘I wouldn’t have been so if you wouldn’t have been there with me,’ Roger told him, nestling his head against the curve between Brian’s neck and shoulder. ‘Thanks for staying with me.’

‘Of course. I’ll always stay with you,’ Brian promised, and he knew he didn’t have to tell Roger that by saying this, he meant both in case of these kind of unplanned hospital visits, and for what he hoped was going to be the rest of their lives. ‘Does it still hurt?’

‘A little,’ Roger said, a bit of a sniff escaping when he said this. It had been a while since he had shed the last tears the pain of the fracture and the fixing of it had caused him, but a dry sob or a sniff like this still escaped him every now and then. Brian nodded his head against Roger’s, giving him a peck on the top of his head and a comforting stroke along his back.

‘Is there anything I can do for you?’ Brian asked sweetly, but when Roger took a second to come up with a reply, he immediately knew it was not going to be something along the range of ‘a kiss’ or ‘some more aspirins’ or anything the like - and he turned out not to be mistaken.

‘Can I have a milkshake on the way back?’ Roger asked, fully aware of the fact that what he was asking for was completely inappropriate for the current situation.

‘Darling, do you really have to push your luck at a moment like this?’ Brian chided him mildly, but the sweetness of Roger’s voice when a nearly begging ‘please?’ fell from his lips, and the reminder of what he had just gone through, made it impossible for Brian to say no to him.

‘Of course you can, if it’s up to me. But John’ll be driving us home, so you’re gonna have to ask him if he wants to stop at a drive through or so-’ Brian told him, but halfway through, he was cut off both by Roger’s voice and the act of Roger pulling away from his embrace.

‘Come, we gotta go to Freddie and John,’ Roger urged as he almost pulled Brian along, and Brian let him - as long as Roger was just going to hold onto his hand and he himself was going to make sure there was nothing in the way, he was sure they could at least safely make it to the waiting room of the hospital to meet up with their friends; Brian for the purpose of relieving them of the tension they had been in over the course of the last one and a half hour, and Roger for asking a favour no one could possibly deny him right now.


End file.
